


Why Do They Kick Me?

by ScaryScarecrows



Series: Cigarette Smoke & Snark [5]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Batman: Arkham (Video Games), Batman: Arkham Knight Genesis (Comics)
Genre: Batdad, Dr. Crane is technologically challenged but we've all got faults, Gen, Jason Todd Needs A Hug, Weird Shit happens in Gotham for the sake of this spindly plot, Whumptober, anyone (that's not Lemon) can die, fear toxin, we do not respect clowns in this house
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:48:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 31
Words: 40,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26749759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScaryScarecrows/pseuds/ScaryScarecrows
Summary: Specifically, ‘waking up restrained’. This one was more of a warm-up for me, but hey.
Series: Cigarette Smoke & Snark [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1515788
Comments: 231
Kudos: 149





	1. Let's Hang Out Sometime

**Author's Note:**

> Specifically, ‘waking up restrained’. This one was more of a warm-up for me, but hey.

Jason comes to with a splitting headache, a horrendous pain in his ankle, and the general feeling that this...is going to be bad.

He’s blindfolded, is the first thing he notices. There’s a soft pressure across his eyes and the tickly feeling of a hem rubbing against his nose. His mask is still on, so’s his armor, but his waist feels light. No belt.

He can work with no belt, if it comes to that. But right now, he has to wait for Batman. That’s rule number one in the event of a kidnapping.

But. He may have to wait a little longer than is ideal, because, well…

Joker. The kindergarten. He’d been going to...he’d turned off his trackers, all of them, taken one of the Wayne Family Guns and…

He’d been trying to do the right thing. The clown deserves death for what he did to those kids. And if he gets out of here before Bruce comes, he’ll finish the job.

Okay. Assess the situation.

He’s sitting up, he finds, tied to a chair. Exploratory rocking says the restraints are solid and that the chair is a wheelchair, one of the shitty ones hospitals use to move you even when you can walk just fine, because God forbid you fall and sue.

(To be fair, he might sue. They can afford it. They charge you ten dollars for a box of tissues.)

He pulls a deep breath in through his nose, holds it for a minute before the exhale. It smells wet, where he is, and the air is cold. The cold is helping his head though, waking him up.

Joker got the drop on him. That’s his fault, he should have been better, more careful. That’s okay, he’ll be okay like he has all the other times.

(Though admittedly, he thinks his ankle might be broken and that’s...new.)

Where  **is** he? Underground, he’s thinking, and in some smallish room; it feels heavy and his breath is too loud to be a big space. Can he just...does he have...nope, not a sharp object to his name. Can he explore?

That turns out to be a big fat no; he’s tied to this chair pretty well, and attempting to just...awkwardly scoot or...something...sends spikes of agony through his ankle and wrenches a yelp of pain from his throat. He can’t see, but he’s sure his vision would be white.

**M’okay...m’okay...just a little pain, m’okay…**

Okay. This might be bad. But he’ll be okay. Bruce will notice, and he’ll come, and oh boy is Jason gonna be in trouble, but he’s gonna be okay. 

At least, that’s what he thinks until something hard, metal and pointy collides with his chest. His armor spares him the broken rib, but the wheelchair goes flying backwards until it crashes into a wall, the impact jostling his ankle.

**Shit.**

“Eh-heh-heh-heh--”

The Joker’s laugh is unmistakable. Jason hates it, but it scares him, too. Joker’s always been a fixture, like Batman, ever since he can remember, and he remembers Mom shaking him and begging him to  **promise** that if he ever saw a clown, he’d run.

Well. There’s that promise broken. Sorry, Mom.

He steels himself for a blow he knows will come sooner or later, gathers up as much Cocky Bastard as he can muster, and throws a vicious sneer in the direction of the laughing.

“That all you got?”

Joker cackles and claps, and then there’s the sound of something metal dragging across concrete.

“Oh, Boy Blunder,  **_we’re just getting started._ ** ”

This time, the hit comes for his head, snapping it back and making his teeth rattle. Blood fills his mouth as his teeth tear his lips and he spits it at the bastard’s feet.

“Go to hell.”

That high cackle fills his ears again and the next thing he knows, soft leather fingers are gripping his wrist and wheeling the chair back, back, until he’s up against a...brick wall. No wonder it’s cold.

“Ohh, Robin, Robin,  **Ro** _ bin _ ,” the clown coos, lips pressed up against Jason’s ear. Jason can almost feel his teeth against his cheek. He’s okay. He’s okay, Bruce will come. Bruce is coming for him right now. “Batman’s not coming this time, kiddo- **gah!** ”

Jason slams his skull against the bastard’s teeth. He thinks he feels one chip. Whatever the case, Joker staggers back, shoes echoing on the tiles, and he sounds a lot less...cuddly...when he speaks again.

“Uncle J will have to teach you some manners.”

“Go ahead and try, freak.” Silence. Jason can’t even hear him breathing anymore, but he knows he’s still here. He has to be. Okay. Keep talking, play for time. That’s how this works. “Batman’s gonna come, and he’s gonna kick your ass and throw you back in Arkham, probably in a body cast, you sick, twisted  **fuck** .”

Nothing. Jason’s just starting to wonder if maybe Joker  **did** leave when the soft leather fingers wrap around his throat and  **squeeze** before slamming his head into the bricks. He gags and tries reflexively to raise his hands and push Joker away, but the ropes hold tight.

“You listen to me, you snot-nosed little brat,” Joker hisses, spit hitting Jason’s face. He can’t breathe. “By the end of this, you will refer to me as  **sir** , do you understand?” He can’t  **breathe.** “I don’t care what I have to do to you.” He  **can’t breathe.** “I’ve got all the time in the world, and don’t you forget that.”  **He can’t breathe.** “Now.” The hand lets go and he gasps, already feeling bruises form. “What do you say to that?”

He wheezes for a minute. Gotta. Gotta keep him talking. Play for time. Just like Bruce taught him. He can do this.

“We-ell?”

He lifts his chin, knows this is gonna hurt, and grins.

“Riddler’s funnier than you.”

It does hurt, for all of thirty seconds. Then the Joker clocks him just right with whatever metal thing he’s got, and Jason’s unconscious.

THE END


	2. In the Hands of the Enemy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I considered doing a substitute, but, well...kidnapping beckoned. Boy Hostage and all...anyways, Jason was a good Robin and DC can fight me in a Wal-Mart parking lot.

Jason isn’t so sure being Bruce Wayne’s adopted son is worth it. Being Robin? Worth it. Even with the risk of some big lug swinging a steel bat into his ribs. Having a rich...parent...guardian-person? Not so much.

He likes Bruce, it’s not that. And he loves Alfred. And Dick is...Dick is there. Dick could be worse. But. The things that come with his new lot in life…

Okay, so it’s mean and awful and a sign that he’s the worst boy in the world, but if one more asshole with a camera ambushes him at any point, they will eat that camera. Jason’ll make it happen. He’s not sure how, but it’s going to happen.

Also, galas. Galas suck. The getting dressed up isn’t so bad. Neither is the small talk, as long as he can escape. (Bruce is great about rescuing him from the old ladies.) It’s just.

He doesn’t belong here. Well,  **he** thinks he does, because it’s his house now, or at least he lives in it and these freeloaders have to get out, but he doesn’t...he’s not one of them. And they know it. And none of them are terribly good at hiding it.

They don’t say anything to his face, and certainly not to Bruce’s-someone did that once and got banned from every Wayne Event, ever, at all-but...they don’t notice him that much. Which, he figures, is a good thing, because it means he really is a good Robin and won’t be spotted by bad guys.

But it still stings to overhear them gossiping over caviar (caviar! Jason’ll eat anything once, but...rich people, man) about ‘Brucie had better have the silverware counted every night’ and ‘that  **Todd** boy--’, in that special tone of voice reserved for dog crap on your shoes. And then they have the audacity to turn around and coo at him and try to pinch his cheeks.

So. He hates galas. They’re bright and loud and populated with rich assholes whose clothing could pay for his mom’s apartment for literally, like, a year. And they don’t even care.

How Bruce didn’t end up like them is mystifying. Jason thinks maybe Alfred can take responsibility for that. It’s the only explanation that isn’t, like, aliens.

Anyways, he’s not-really hiding a little ways away from the dance floor, where it’s not so loud and there’s not too many people, when there’s a gunshot.

Jason knows gunshots. Robin aside, he’s been hearing them his whole life. Part of him wants to hunker down and hide for real, because he’s not dumb, but the other part, the Robin part, says he’s gotta find a way out so he can, y’know, deal with this.

But something’s not right. Bruce isn’t vanishing off somewhere, he’s just still. And on the ground in front of him is a woman. Jason met her earlier tonight; Geraldine McGrew, fifty-odd (says she’s forty-nine), on the board of Wayne Enterprises. She wasn’t...as bad...as some of the others. 

But she’s bleeding. It’s not showing on her deep blue dress, but the red puddle beneath her is impossible to mistake.

“Just so you know we’re serious,” a man says cheerfully. He’s masked, and armed, and  _ okay, this is not how gala robberies work. _ “Now. Everybody empty your pockets and purses, and take off your jewelry.”

Bruce is pissed. Jason can see it from here. When Bruce gets well and truly enraged, he looks like Batman even if he’s wearing that horrifying short pink robe*. But all he does is thrust his wallet at the man before kneeling down to, presumably, attempt to stop Geraldine’s bleeding. Okay. So Batman’s busy. But Robin hasn’t been noticed yet, and he’d like to keep it that way.

There’s three guys, and none of them are near him, which means he can slide down and duck under the table. Okay. He’s not getting out of here, but maybe he can improvise, like Bruce does sometimes. Cut the lights, yeah, cut the lights and pick ‘em off. He can do that, suit or no suit, and, uh…

Batman must’ve showed up, yes, perfect.

Unfortunately, the light switch is on the other side of the room. But that’s okay! The table is long, and he can maybe scurry under one more before he has to make a break for it. He can do this. He can totally do this.

He makes it under the second table with no problem, and then...then the shit hits the fan. Somebody-some old man whose name Jason does not remember or really care to remember-decides to hem and haw and generally refuse to cooperate.

“--no right-!”

“Oh, we got every right, Granddad,” one of the men snarls. “In fact, maybe you wanna come with us, huh? As a little insurance.”

He can’t reach the lights now. They’re looking over here because Old Man Dope had to mouth off.

Whatever, whatever. He can mouth off, too. Dick even told him it was a valuable Robin Skill.

(Though it could just be that Dick can never shut up.)

“Hey! Asshole!”

Bruce is gonna kill him. Bruce will just have to cope.

They look at him and a younger woman-daughter, maybe?-pulls Old Man away a little. Well, he’s in it now.

“Leave the old guy alone!”

They’re all looking at him and Jason basically hates this now. He’s really feeling the lack of body armor and you know what, if he dies because of this, he’s haunting the old geezer as punishment.

“Who’s the kid?”

The leader comes closer, and Jason can  **hear** the grin in his voice when he says, “That’s Wayne’s boy, huh? Isn’t it, Brucie?”

“Leave him alone.”

Shut up, Bruce, he’s...mostly got this handled.

“He is.” He’s grabbed and yeah, he could get out of this, but...people are looking. Jason Todd is not allowed to be able to flip a bastard over his shoulder and knee him in the face.

God  **dammit** .

Bruce has gone from ‘pissed’ to ‘apoplectic’. Jason almost feels sorry for these schmucks.

Almost.

“We’re going to go now,” the man holding him says. “Follow, and the kid gets a bullet in the head. We’ll be in touch.”

Fancy flips are out. Elbows to the crotch are in, yes? That’s allowed? He thinks that’s allowed.

The strangled yelp is hilarious. The swift retaliation of a gun butt to the head is not.

* * *

Jason comes to tied to a chair. His clothes are still on, but he’s blindfolded, there’s dried blood on his face and in his hair, and he’s got a killer headache.

Ohhhh, he’s going to be so grounded after this…

The knots aren’t great. He could, feasibly, work his way free, but first things first; assess the situation.

He’s not alone. His captors are here, too, arguing quietly amongst themselves. Okay. He’s not conscious yet, honest.

“--never wakes up, man?”

“Then we ransom his body back to Wayne,” the leader says easily. Wow. Hurtful. “But right now? He’s fine. He’s still breathing, which means he’s worth a little somethin’-somethin’.” Well, that can’t be good. “Penguin said he’d be interested…”

That’s not good. Penguin  **hates** Bruce-some family feud-and Jason doubts he’ll let this opportunity just fly by.

“--waitin’ to hear back from Two-Face, but Joker said maybe--” Well, shit. “--and Black Mask is  **definitely** interested.”

Yeah, that’s really not good. Penguin might shoot him. Black Mask will sell him overseas and that’ll be the end of him.

He may have made a mistake--no. No. There’s two trackers in this monkey suit, one in his right shoe and one in the third button down on his shirt. Bruce will be here soon and he’ll teach these punks a lesson and then they’ll go home and he’ll be grounded, but he’ll be fine. He’s just gotta be brave until he gets here.

“So we’re not givin’ Wayne an offer?”

“He’s never paid ransom. Batman always shows up; he’s on Wayne’s payroll or somethin’.” Well, they’re not wrong. “He can deal with whoever ends up with the kid, I don’t care. Now go over there and try to wake him up, the Mask wants pictures.”

Jason keeps up the unconscious act as footsteps get closer, but when a sweaty hand smacks his cheek, he bites it. There’s a screech and the ensuing punch makes him see stars, blindfold or no blindfold.

“Quit roughin’ up the merchandise!”

“The little shit bit me!” He’ll do it again, too. “He fucking bit me!” Blech. His mouth tastes terrible and he wants Listerine. Bruce had better have some in his belt. Or at least a Tic Tac.

“Guess he’s awake.” No shit. Footsteps-heavy boots, steel-toed, sounds like-come over and then there’s the feeling of somebody in his personal space. “How you doin’, kiddo?”

Okay. He’s gotta play this right. He can fight back a little-Bruce did find him in an alley, after all, that’s acceptable-but he can’t be too gung-ho about it. He  **did** get kidnapped. So this ain’t his first bank robbery. They don’t know that.

But geeze, his head is killing him. That punch  **really** didn’t help.

“What do you want?” There, that’s good, right? Not too cocky, but not crying or anything. 

There’s laughter above him, and a new hand tousles his hair. He doesn’t try to bite the hand, but it’s very tempting.

“Who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth? Wayne’s brat volunteers to come with us, I’d be dumb to leave you behind.” The hand goes down, pulls him into a side-hug. Jason stiffens right up. He can’t help it, it’s just...he doesn’t. He doesn’t  **like** it when strange men hug him. Or strange women, but mostly strange men. “Look alive, kid, we have to get some pictures of you.”

“Screw you.” That’s reflexive, not thought through at all, but he wants this guy to  **let go** . “You know what’s happened to everyone else that’s kidnapped a Wayne? They get their asses--”

Fingers tangle in his hair and yank his head back, exposing his throat.

“We’re not giving you back to Wayne, kid. Not even trying. So shut up and look pretty for the camera.”

_ Hurry up, Bruce. _

He’s released and the blindfold’s untied. Okay. The room’s pretty well-lit, looks like an empty apartment or something. No windows. Only one door. Three guys, including the one in his personal space. Easy pickings for Batman, even with no window.

Okay. He’s not gonna mouth off to the camera, that’s suspicious. But he’s not going to cry, either. He’s just going to sit right here and sulk. Maybe look a little nervous. Which is an act! He’s not nervous. Bruce is on his way here  **right now** .

There’s the flash of a phone’s camera and he blinks hard, seeing dots on his eyelids. Someone laughs, but that quickly turns to an annoyed, “Dammit, he moved.”

“Hang on.” He’s grabbed again, fingers wrapping tight around his jaw. “Got him.”

The fingers are very snug. The owner of the fingers is pressed up behind him. And Jason--

**Not again.**

He wants to pull free. He can, he thinks. But...he can’t move. His muscles are all locked up and he doesn’t want this, not again.

**Never again.**

“Let  **go** of me!”

He slams his head into the chest. The fingers recoil immediately and there’s harsh, pained coughing. He works the small blade he keeps in his sleeves (meant for ropes, but…) into his hand and when the body gets too close, he jams it into the arm.

**Stupid, should’ve--**

“Sonofabitch!”

He topples the chair and it breaks. Piece of shit, but he’s free, they’re not--

**BLAM!**

The gunshot stops him in his tracks. He’s charged at guns before, knows they won’t hit him if he keeps moving**, but he’s on the ground now.

And that’s Robin that charges guns.

Fuck.

The man with the gun comes closer, presses the barrel to his forehead, and.

And now he’s scared.

He’s just drawing in one last, desperate breath when there’s  **noise** outside and he’s being yanked up by the arm, held tightly against another body with the gun shoved under his chin.

“Any more crap and you’ll be goin’ back to Wayne, all right, in a pine box.”

Breaking the hold is too risky. Witnesses aside, there’s the small matter of the gun.

This isn’t good.

There’s a shout, and the door splinters open as someone’s kicked through it. The flying body knocks over somebody else. 

Bruce. Bruce is here.

Batman’s normal MO is hiding in the shadows, and Jason’ll admit that it works. But, even knowing it’s dorky, banned-from-the-kitchen Bruce under there, seeing him in full lighting is...frightening. Bruce is big. The cape makes him bigger. And right now, he’s clearly pissed.

**I’m sorry,** he tries to say with his eyes.  **I was trying to help.**

Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t, but the gun presses tighter against his skin and he closes his eyes for a second before forcing them back open.

**“Let him go.”**

Yeah, he’s pissed.

“Get out of my way, Batman,” the man behind him spits. “Or I shoot him.”

It’s the guy he...sort of stabbed; Jason can just see his blade sticking out of his arm. He’s breathing hard, but the hand holding the gun is steady. So’s the hand yanking Jason’s head back.

Bruce just looks at them, and Jason knows he’s gonna do it, but that doesn’t stop him from flinching when he flings a smoke pellet down.

“Shit,” the man hisses, shoves him forward in the general direction of the door. He’s hacking, though, and so’s Jason, and neither of them can see a damn thing--

**“No-!”**

He’s released and he staggers forward, struggling to get a breath in, and then he’s grabbed. He panics, flails blindly at the arms around his chest, and--

“Jason,” Bruce-and it is Bruce, it’s that soft, ‘just a nightmare, Jay-lad, you’re safe’ voice-murmurs in his ear. “I’ve got you. Be still.”

He’s okay. Bruce is here.

* * *

He’s left safely with Gordon and then, like magic, Bruce comes screaming up in his flashy, electric blue convertible (Dick calls it the midlife crisis car).

“Jason-!”

It’s not total acting when he gloms on. It is a little-mostly, even-but...not all of it.

They go home. The house is empty, now, and here it comes. The lecture. The grounding.

“I was tryin’ ta help,” he says quickly. “I had a better plan--”

“Jason--”

“But I had to change it ‘cause that old ba-ugger--”

“Jason--”

“I was just gonna cut the lights--”

“Jason!” He shuts up. “I’m not angry with you.” Huh. “I was  _ worried _ .” Sometimes, that’s the same thing with Bruce. “That was a reckless thing you did.”

“I was--”

“Trying to help, I  _ know. _ ” Bruce puts a hand on his shoulder. “But you could have been killed, and no robbery is worth your life.”

He jerks free. It’s not Bruce’s fault, he just...no touching right now, okay?

“Sorry,” he mutters. “I was just tryin’ ta help.”

“Jason…”

“M’goin’ to bed. You can yell at me in the morning, okay?”

“I’m not--”

“Please,” he says, and he knows he sounds a little hysterical, but his head hurts and he’s keyed up and he just  **can’t** , not now. “In the morning, Bruce,  _ please _ .”

Maybe Bruce wants to argue. Jason doesn’t care; he knows he won’t grab him, which means he can go upstairs and lock his bedroom door behind him.

The shower’s a relief, the hot water pounding against his skin and wiping away all traces of strangers’ fingers and the stiff suit Bruce stuffed him in for the gala. He ends up sitting under the spray, head throbbing (that’ll bruise…) and muscles tense and shuddering.

The house is silent when he drags himself out of the bathroom. He’s not reading tonight, he’s going to go straight to bed.

The knock on his door half-startles him out of his skin, and it’s an effort to keep his voice steady when he says, “M’just going to bed.”

“Jay-lad…”

“Good  **night** , Bruce.” Just let it go, just for tonight,  _ please _ . 

Silence on the other side, then a soft, “I am proud of you, Jay, for stepping in.” What. “Good night.”

By the time Jason processes any of that, Bruce is gone. He doesn’t open the door and try to find him, just crawls under his blankets and turns off the lamp.

He dreams of gunshots and warm, grabbing fingers.

THE END

*Bruce’s pink robe appears in  _ White Knight _ . It’s so bad. It doesn’t fit him. I’m convinced he bought it at Victoria’s Secret.

**See Jason’s ‘can’t shoot me if I kick you in the face first!’ trick in  _ Under the Red Hood _ .


	3. My Way or the Highway

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Forced to their knees, held at gunpoint.  
> I am a simple woman. Give me scary slasher-villain Jason soothing a child and my crops are watered for ten years.

Miriam wants her mommy.

Well. She wants a lot of things. She wants to go home, she wants her dolly, she wants to not hurt.

She’s been in this basement for...days, maybe. She thinks days. Maybe longer, even. She’d been getting the mail and then a man had driven by and stuffed her in the trunk of his car and then…

Then she’d been here. She hurts. She’s hungry. And she wants Mommy to come get her.

There’s noises, upstairs. They’ve been getting louder and that’s why she’s huddled under the stairs, knees pulled inside the man’s gross shirt he’d thrown at her the first day. She can’t breathe right and she doesn’t know what’s happening, just that there’s noise.

The basement door opens and there’s a  **thud-clump!** noise, followed by the heavy footsteps she’s learnt to recognize. The light doesn’t come on, but there’s some coming down from upstairs; enough to see another person, someone big. Another man?

“Thought you’d be tougher,” the Bad Man says mockingly. The new man coughs wetly and rolls onto his back.

“You’re a sick son of a bitch.”

Miriam knows that voice. She  **knows** that voice. Red Hood. Red’s here, she’s gonna go home, she’s gonna go  **home** .

The Bad Man comes down the stairs and Red  **moves** , sweeping his leg against the Bad Man’s ankles and making him fall. Then Red’s on his feet and Miriam’s about to poke her head out when there’s a sudden loud  **BANG!** that echoes in the dark basement. Red staggers back, one hand going to his side, and the Bad Man snarls, “She’s under the stairs. Move, and I shoot her.”

She lies flat, just like Mommy always taught her to do when there’s gunfire, but she can still see, just enough. Red’s still even as the Bad Man comes up and pushes him to his knees. He’s breathing hard and his helmet’s broken and Miriam…

Mommy says Red’s just a man, under there. Miriam’s not really sure, but...Mommy’s not ever wrong, either. Well, almost not ever. Sometimes she’s wrong about whether there’s Pop-Tarts. But right now, with his helmet broken and his white shirt darkening above his hip, she thinks maybe Mommy’s right again.

“You’ve got about five minutes to make your peace,” Red spits. The Bad Man aims a kick at his side and he chokes and doubles over. 

“Could say the same to you, but I’m not giving you that long.”

“Miriam.” She doesn’t come out, but she hopes he understands. “You close your eyes, okay, kiddo? Keep ‘em shut ‘til I say. S’gonna. S’gonna be okay, I promise, just don’t peek.”

Okay.

She catches a glimpse of the Bad Man pressing a gun into the hole in Red’s helmet before she squeezes her eyes shut. Seconds tick by with no sound other than Red’s pained breathing.

**BLAM!**

She screams. She can’t help it. But she keeps her eyes shut, curls into the smallest ball she can. There’s scuffling, and screamed curses, and a  **cricking** sound. Then silence.

Heavy footsteps scuff towards the stairs. Miriam’s crying now, as quietly as she can. He’s gonna kill her, now, she just knows it…

“S’okay, kiddo. C’mon outta there, huh?”

“Mr. Red!” She scrambles out and he shrugs out of his jacket, zips his hoodie up before wrapping her in the leather and hefting her up. “You’re okay!”

“Told ya it’d be okay, didn’t I?” He settles her on his hip and trudges towards the stairs. She catches a glimpse of a sprawled body before tucking her head into his shoulder. “Let’s getcha home.”

She starts bawling in earnest, now, and wraps her arms around his neck. The big hand supporting her thighs twitches a little but otherwise, he keeps moving; up the stairs, through a carpeted room, and outside.

It’s nighttime, and it’s cold, and Red’s moving slowly and jerkily. But his grip on her is steady, and after a few minutes, he starts talking.

“You’re gonna be home before you know it, kiddo,” he says, voice tight. “Your momma’s worried sick about you.”

“My tummy hurts,” is all she can force out. “My tummy  _ hurts _ .”

“I know, kiddo. I know. I’m sorry.”

She sniffles.

When she manages to lift her head, they’re just walking up to her apartment. Red sighs and stops, breathing heavy, and says, “You up for the fast track?”

“Fast track?”

“Straight to your living room window.”

They’re three stories up.

“Okay?”

“Okay. Hang on tight, huh? I won’t let you fall, but still.”

Huh?

She hangs on, though, and they  **whoosh** up, like Peter Pan, and when she blinks they’re on the porch. Mommy’s there, flinging open the door with a frantic,  _ “Miriam!” _

“Mommy!”

Mommy takes her out of Red’s jacket. She’s crying, too, and she hugs Miriam way too hard.

“Oh, baby--Jesus--”

“Ba-ad guy’s down,” Red says, voice still tight. “He won’t be a problem again.”

“Thank you--”

“Stay safe.”

She sort of hears him take a few steps, but Mommy’s running inside and locking the door.

She’s home. She’s safe. The Bad Man can’t hurt her anymore.

THE END


	4. Running Out of Time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Collapsed building. Sorry this is up a little later in the day, Mr. Lucas has been...a little bit of a shithead this morning.

Jason’s not sure what idiot blew up the building, but it certainly wasn’t him. He doesn’t go in much for explosions unless he’s going to be far, far away when they go. That meth lab that he did last month, with the C-4 in the walls*? He was safe at home when that went. This clusterfuck? Not his fault. He’s not even sure how this happened, but he’s thinking it was those trigger-happy idiots that set up shop here.

Unfortunately, this old apartment building is fragile, and not only did the upper floors collapse, but Jason ended up in the damn basement, and to make matters worse, a shard of what he hopes was wood sliced his thigh on the way down, and now he’s stuck and bleeding.

Not helping the situation is that his flashlight  **and** his helmet broke in the fall, so he’s left fumbling around to try and suss out what sort of damage has been done. He thinks something bad happened to his wrist, and his elbow definitely hurts, but the real problem is his thigh, which is bleeding kind of a lot. That slice must’ve been deep, or lucky. Feels deep. Probably s’gonna need stitches.

He flops back on the concrete and just breathes. This could be worse, really; he’s supposed to check in with Alfred, because Alfie’s getting over the flu and he used that to guilt Jason into calling when he got in. Something about ‘an old man can’t take stress at this time’. It was a dirty move, but now, he’s glad. Alfred will notice and Jason will be rescued. In a minute, he’ll try to deal with his thigh, but. In a minute. Give him a minute.

He’s just sitting up when there’s a noise and he freezes. Is someone else down here? God, he hopes not; the only people in this building were him and the people that were trying to kill him. He’s got bullets-hell, if he has to, he can snap a neck-but he’d much rather just lie here and catch his breath.

There’s no more noise. Okay, building settling, then. Big deal. He props himself up and bends over to investigate his thigh.

**Ouch.** Yeah, that needs stitches, and he’s going to be off it for a week. It’s deep, it hurts, he’s lucky it didn’t hit anything important.

He digs out the roll of bandages he keeps inside his jacket and, tongue between his teeth, starts doing a rough wrap job to deal with the bleeding. He’s had worse, but this does hurt and he’s now  **very** much looking forward to getting home to lick his wounds in peace.

**Gruuuumble.**

That’s not a good noise. Jason knows that noise from a hellish case that ended in the sewers. The sewers Killer Croc lives in.

Croc used to be reasonable, at least sometimes. Cannibalistic, yes, scary, definitely, but not a dumb animal. But the last few years, his...condition...has made him worse. Bigger. Scalier. And, uh, honestly, Jason’s not sure how much of his mind is there anymore. He doesn’t talk too much, and he works alone, rather than with henchmen like he used to. And...well…

Croc used to set traps, sure, don’t they all. But now? He  **hunts** . And he’s good at it.

Maybe he misheard.  **Hopefully** he misheard. He’s still got the scar from his last encounter with Croc, visible even under what Joker did. He really, really doesn’t want to face Croc now, injured and trapped and with no way to call for help...or for help to come.

Okay. Okay. He misheard, obviously, but just to be safe, he’s going to stay very still and very quiet.

He finishes his wrap and tucks his hands under his arms, shivering. Oof, he hopes Alfred tries to check in soon.

**Grrr.**

That sounds bad.

As quietly as he can, teeth clenched so as not to make a noise, he forces himself to his feet. The noise was directly in front of him, but, like...several feet in front of him. Across the room somewhere. So he’s just going to go to the other side, as far back as he can, and not make any noise.

It’s slow, painful going and by the time he sits down again, his leg’s killing him and his breath is coming a little harder than he’d like. If he could just  **see** …

He has no warning before there’s a roar and the sound of a cement slab hitting the ground. The floor quakes and there’s the sound of something scuffing, and then the unmistakable sound of an animal sniffing the air. He draws his gun, knowing it won’t save him.

There’s more sniffing sounds, and then heavy footsteps. If he could just see, even eyeshine…

The footsteps stop, only to be replaced by deep, even breaths. Maybe Croc hasn’t noticed him yet. He’s never been that lucky before, but it’s bound to happen sometime.

When the footsteps don’t start up again, Jason shakilly pulls himself as close against the wall as possible and wonders what’s going on. His best guess is that Croc got buried by accident, and is therefore maybe too out of it to notice-or even care-that someone else is down here. Surely, he reasons, those idiots wouldn’t have been here if they’d known he was here. Even Bruce won’t go up against Croc alone, or without heavy preparation. Hell, even when Jason was Robin, Croc got more plan time than Penguin or even Scarecrow.

Then again, Gotham Henchmen are, well...they’re not bright. Heaven help ‘em, they’d drink bleach for the flu. But most of ‘em have enough self-preservation to leave Croc alone, so.

His thigh is killing him, but now that he’s still again, the other injuries are starting to make themselves obvious. Namely his wrist, which doesn’t want to bend or twist. It’s his dominant hand-thrust out to stop his fall, most likely-and he can still shoot with the other, but. Yeah. This is a little bit bad.

He’d love to close his eyes, just for a minute, even, but he can’t and he knows it. Being off-guard could mean death.

Croc is still breathing heavily on the other side of the room. Jason’s starting to hope that he’s going to sleep or something when there’s a snarled,  **“I smell you.”**

Well. That’ll teach him to hope for more than an extra McNugget ever again.

He doesn’t engage. Croc makes a noise that could be construed as a chuckle and there’s the sound of shifting rubble, and of claws scraping the cement. He’s just resigning himself to a gruesome death when there’s a thud and a grunt of pain, and then silence.

Okay. Croc’s not great off, either. Good. Good.

What does he have? Anything?

He has his guns and bullets, for all the good they’ll do, a couple of flashbang grenades, several knives-including his good one-and a variant of Bruce’s explosive gel. The gel is usually for stubborn doors and weak walls, but he’s tweaked it; instead of a spray can, it’s a sticky patch, easier to place without noise and also a little harder to spot.

(Well, to be fair, Bruce insists on drawing a stupid a bat  **every** time. Jason has a little more self-control and a lot less commitment to branding.)

He doesn’t want to resort to the gel. Not with the building already unstable; the floor feels like it’ll open up a pit to Hell, if he’s being honest. But he wants to be eaten even less, so he digs out the patches, places them a good few feet in front of him, and drags himself along the wall until he finds a little alcove created by a toppled pillar. There. There’s his last resort. Ideally, Croc will nurse his wounds on his side of the room and Jason can hide over here and sooner or later, Bruce will get his ass down here. Or Dick. Or, if Jason’s incredibly unlucky, Drake.

Or hell, the rescue people will open a hole and he can pop out like a hellish Whack-a-Mole. He likes that option. Could be funny.

The image of a Whack-a-Mole with a red helmet fades, leaving him alone in the dark. He tries, really he does, not to think about the last time he was trapped in a basement, injured and waiting for Bruce. This isn’t like that. He has trackers now, and they work. Alfred will see and he’ll send one of the others and he’ll be fine.  **He has trackers.**

But.

The thing is, he’s never...he’s never been sure if he got all his trackers last time. He was pretty sure he had, at the time, but Bruce-paranoid fucker Bruce-is the type of person to just not mention one or two.

It’s irrational, he knows that, but...but. It’s a thought that had come up, more than once, especially after he got a new kid so quickly.

He shifts a little and pain lances up through his leg, startling him out of going down  **that** path. It’s okay. He’s going to be okay, Bruce will come this time. He got all the trackers last time, that was his own fault.

**He’s gonna come for me, I know it, s’gonna be okay.**

Now, though, now that the thought’s gotten in his head, he keeps going back to it. This would be a fine way to get rid of the failed Robin once and for all. After all, he didn’t have the good sense to die quietly last time and--

**Stop it. We’re not doing this again.**

Besides, so Bruce doesn’t come. Big whoop. Jason’s a big boy now, he can take care of himself. And just to prove it to himself, he takes out his best knife, digs the tip into his palm until it’s just shy of drawing blood, and tries to count his breaths.

**One, two, three, four...**

**Rrrr.**

He freezes, crams himself as far into his little alcove as possible, and tries to pretend his leg isn’t telling him that if he tries to run, it will drop him like an ‘I’m fallen and I can’t get up!’ ad.

Silence. He’s starting to calm down again-as much as he can, given the circumstances-when a gust of hot, putrid air ruffles his hair and a massive, slimy tongue slides over the back of his head.

He panics and twists around, flailing with the knife. It slices through the tongue and Croc  **shrieks** , jerking back and thrashing his head. Blood flies everywhere and Jason--

\--Jason tells his leg to just fuckin’ cope before scrambling out of the alcove and lurching to the other side of the room. Or. Trying to, anyway; the leg gives out after maybe seven steps and he ends up dragging himself behind a stack of rotting crates.

Okay. Okay. He’s okay. He’s okay. That’ll teach Croc, maybe. Hopefully. If it didn’t just piss him off…

Croc’s still snorting like an engine, grunting and puffing and panting. Jason can hear  **dripping** over there. That was close. Too close.

**Keep your damn head in the game.**

Well. This isn’t good. His insurance was intended, mostly, to fend off Croc if he came at him head-on. And yes, he knows he should’ve thought it through, but he’s not willing to just place explosives all over the room. He’s not  **that** dumb.

He pulls his now-throbbing wrist against his chest and tries to come up with a plan of defense. He could move again, maybe, but it’ll be slow going and leave him wide open. No, better to stay here as long as he can. He’s got his knife, and he’s got his guns, and he’s got his flashbangs. He’s okay. He’s gonna stay right here.

Croc snorts and huffs and falls silent, but he’s breathing a little heavier now and Jason can still hear the dripping of blood. He got him good, then.

He sets the knife in his lap and pulls out one of his grenades. Wonders, a little, how big Croc’s become.

Decides he doesn’t really want to know.

The building shifts and groans above him. Help? Or the structure about to crumble and crush him? No, no crumbling; the sounds stop soon enough.

God, his leg hurts…

He shouldn’t, and he doesn’t mean to, but he slumps against the chilly wall. It feels wonderful against his head and his eyes flutter shut against his will. Just a minute, s’dark already…

**No!**

He gives himself a little shake and squeezes the grenade.

At least the last time he was stuck in a room with Croc, he wasn’t alone. He was scared shitless, sure, and hurt worse than this, but he hadn’t been alone.

The building groans again and something collapses upstairs. It’s loud and metal-the echo-y shrieking followed by a deep  **BANG!** Is a dead giveaway-and it almost,  _ almost _ hides the sound of movement from across the room.

**I hear you, you ugly bastard.**

He sheathes his knife, takes a deep breath, and gets ready to move. There’s no more movement sounds now, but the dripping has stopped.

**Where are you?**

_ Plink. _

**THERE.**

He lobs the grenade as he’s struggling to his feet. It goes off and Croc roars in pain and  **woah** , he’s changed. Bigger. More teeth. Scales going down his back. He looks like Godzilla, not even close to the thing that haunted Jason’s nightmares for weeks after the incident as Robin.

He doesn’t even look human anymore.

Croc lunges forward, but it’s awkward and slow and lurching. Jason’s not much better, but he doesn’t have to use his arms to move, at least, and he manages to stagger out of reach. Croc hits the wall.

Jason lobs another grenade-three left, make ‘em count-and keeps moving. His leg’s killing him and he’s off-balance with his right arm cradled like it is. But God, he doesn’t want to die to that.

The flash shows him a little more; yellow eyes that have moved back in his skull, a bulging arm that doesn’t match the other, and burn scars on his face. Ohh, what Jason would give for a molotov right now…

**“STAY STILL!”**

He can’t do a quip. It’s all he’s got to stay on his feet. But he’s almost gotten his explosive between him and Croc.

**Come on, come on.**

Another grenade sets Croc rearing back, smashing his head into the ceiling. Jason trips on who knows what and lands on his ass. When he tries to get up, his wrist  **cracks** and he winds up on his back, seeing white.

**No, no...please no…**

**Thump. Thump. Thump.**

The ground shakes. Jason tries to crawl backwards and just can’t. Something drips onto his chest, then onto his face.

**Not like this!**

He fumbles for another grenade and comes up with the detonator instead. It’ll have to do.

**BOOM!**

**“NOOOOOO!”**

Jason himself goes flying into the wall, head hitting the cement with a sickening  **crack!** The last thing he sees is Croc flailing at the air, and then nothing.

THE END

*See this (or, well, the canon version) in  _ Under the Red Hood _ . It’s impressive. And people say he’s the angry, impatient Robin...pshaw. He is not.


	5. Where Do You Think You're Going?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rescue.

The rain’s coming down in sheets and Dove hates it, especially **here** , where there’s a crap-ton of ‘hitchhikers may be escaping inmates!’ signs.

She’ll be home soon, all done and over from delivering some handsomely-paid-for evidence that while the Riddler may be a criminal, he didn’t commit **that** crime and therefore is unlawfully detained in Arkham. He’ll be out by tomorrow and probably right back in on Tuesday, because Batman, but whatever, he’ll have a week. Maybe.

She kinda wishes she’d taken up Charlie’s offer to come with her, but it hadn’t been raining then. And it hadn’t been meant to take this long.

Between the rain and the darkness, she has no warning whatsoever before there’s a flash of color in her headlights. She hits the brakes and is like…eighty percent…sure she doesn’t hit them, but if it’s an inmate and they find out she didn’t stop, she’s screwed.

She rolls down the window. A bit. Sees nothing, and opens the car door, leans out and remembers too late that her umbrella’s in the backseat.

Oh, well.

The rain’s coming down in icy daggers and she **knows** it’s going to turn into snow later. She doesn’t see any color, at first, and figures maybe it was nothing-a misplaced jack-in-the-box, maybe-when she finally spots another flash of yellow on the side of the road.

It’s barely yellow, more grungy brown and now muddy to boot, but it’s there and it only takes a few seconds to register it as Robin-yellow.

“Oh, my God,” she breathes, sloshes through the mud and prays to **anyone** listening that she didn’t just kill Batman’s missing kid. “Oh, my God…c’mon, Robin, wake up…Jesus Christ, please don’t be dead…”

She didn’t kill him, anyway. She can hear him wheezing from here and when she gets closer he stirs, forces himself onto his back and tries to crawl away before going still, eyes closed and arms curled over his head.

“Fuck.” She crouches down. Partly it’s dark, partly it’s raining and partly he’s a muddy (bloody) mess, but she can’t make out what could be broken, ripped open…nothing. His limbs are all there, that’s the best she’s got. “Fuck, kid, okay…”

No way Joker let him go. No way. Dove knows he’ll come looking, if he isn’t already. She can’t just leave him here, the clown’ll be furious, he’ll kill him.

“Okay, Robin, okay, it’s gonna be okay, I’m gonna get ya somewhere safe, huh?”

She gets her hands under his arms and he jerks his head, coughs and whimpers, “Please don’t do it again.”

Jesus Christ--what was that?

She doesn’t know what idiot insisted on letting the woods around Arkham grow this wild. Crane may have been crazy and evil, but she’ll give him credit, the few escapees he had during his tenure were caught and dealt with very, very quickly, in no small part due to the lack of fucking trees. But whoever’s in charge now (they rotate so quickly…) either doesn’t have the budget or just doesn’t care, because they’re dense and dark and there could be anybody in them.

But right now, she doesn’t see anyone. She thought that was movement, but she was apparently mistaken. Or someone else is escaping, someone who just wants to get moving.

**Not my circus, not my monkeys.**

Robin’s shaking in her arms, hands clawing weakly at hers, and it doesn’t matter. They gotta go.

“Shh, shh, baby,” she soothes. “You’re gonna be okay. Think you can stand up?”

“Please, m’sorry…”

Probably not, then.

The mud is probably the best thing that could exist right now: it makes dragging him to the car a **lot** easier than it should be. She’ll worry about the upholstery later. For now, she’s good to lay the seat down and cover him with her coat before cranking the heater and flooring it.

And hope to God that flash of white out of the corner of her eye was an orderly.

* * *

Robin spends most of the ride either unconscious or otherwise unresponsive, but he perks up a bit when they hit midtown. Well. It’s all relative; he burrows into her coat and opens his eyes, anyway. Doesn’t react when she tries to talk to him, though. Just sits there, face tight and resigned.

Hospitals are out of the question. It’s easy, ridiculously easy, to get in there; murder a nurse and pop right in. Richardson does it all the time. She’ll call Jim, when she gets home, get him to get Batman and that shouldn’t take long at all. It’s safer. He got out of…of wherever he was (Arkham?), he can hold on until Batman can come and get him.

He’s capable of getting up, of letting her half-carry him into her apartment’s elevator, but he ends up on his knees before they’ve even hit the second floor.

Here, in the harsh lights, he looks awful; bloody and bruised and scared. He’s favoring his left ankle, trying to keep it away from the rest of his body, and Dove does **not** wanna know. 

His head’s slumped towards his chest and when she reaches down to lift it, see if he’s drugged, he flinches and whispers, “Please don’t hurt me, m’sorry, I won’t run again.”

“No, no, honey.” Maybe drugged, or maybe just sick; his skin’s burning under her fingers. His eyes are glazed over, pupils blown wide, and she doesn’t think he’s seeing her. “I’m not gonna hurt you, I’m gonna get you cleaned up a bit, try to get you home, huh?”

He doesn’t seem to understand.

“M’sorry,” he whispers again, a few tears carving tracks through the blood and dirt on his cheeks before hitting her palm, and she lets him go, watches the floor count go up. He wobbles a bit, fingers tensing against the carpet, and she’s not sure if she should try to steady him or not. She’s gonna go with not; they’re almost there and so far he hasn’t put up a fight.

She’d like to keep it that way.

Whatever’s up with his ankle, he gets to his feet when she tugs on his arms, shuffles down the hall with her and manages to stay semi-upright while she gets her door open. 

“Okay, kid, okay.” There. Door’s locked again, deadbolt ‘n all. “Let’s just…shower. C’mon, just a few feet, that’s all.”

She doesn’t even try to get his costume off, not now, not like this. It’s easier to just half-help, half-haul him into the bathtub and let him sink down, trembling and clearly trying not to cry.

The warm water makes him jump, at first, but he stays still after that, fingers knotted under his knees. The gunk that comes off him is reddish-brown and after a few minutes she can make out marks from barbed wire, and gashes in his uniform. He’s still and silent, gazing blankly at the rubber bath mat under him, and only flinches once when the water hits what turns out to be a ragged slash near his inner elbow.

“M’sorry.”

“Shh, don’t be sorry, sweetheart, there’s nothing to be sorry for.”

He’s quiet, after that, and she resolutely does _not_ think about Joker’s ‘conditioning’ methods.

Once he’s sodden, she shuts the water off and nudges his head up, rubs a warm washcloth across his face. He sits there and lets her, doesn’t even try to struggle, and honestly…honestly, it’s unsettling. What happened to the boy that straight-up asked Penguin about the bottle in his eye socket?

“Okay, baby,” she murmurs, thumb rubbing dried blood off his cheekbone. “Okay, there we go… _there_ you are.”

Sheesh. He looked bad before. Now? Without the excuse of grime? Those bruises are dark, like Harley’s can be, and the ones just under his jaw look like someone was trying to force something (pills food worse?) down his throat. He looks at her, still blank, before dropping his head back down and trying to hide a shiver.

“I’ll turn the water back on in a minute, but I wanna at least get your cape off, maybe the rest of this, huh?”

That rouses him a little more, makes him try to pull his head away and maybe try to get up, but he’s too unsteady to do much besides wobble.

“No, no—”

“Just to get you cleaned up, you’re a mess.”

He shakes his head but doesn’t fight her when she fumbles for the clasps on his cape. There’s nothing to do with it but toss it in the trash can; Batman wants it, he can come and get it.

She’ll worry about the rest of him later. Right now? Shampoo.

He cringes at the splop-splop noise it makes leaving the bottle and tries to pull his head away from her hands. But not for long-when her fingers dig into his scalp he stills, breath hitching in his throat.

“S’okay, kid, s’okay. Just gonna get some’a this crap off’a you, huh? Just a bit?”

He doesn’t answer her, just plunks his forehead against his knees and starts to cry.

* * *

He protests, once or twice more, when she gets him undressed the rest of the way, but once he’s out of the tub and in a shirt and some old sweats of hers he’s quiet again.

She has no idea what to do with him now. Call Jim, maybe. But first, bed.

Whatever kept him up and moving before-stubbornness, desperation, adrenaline-is spent and he doesn’t even try to help when she pulls him up. Surely he should be heavier than this, it shouldn’t be this easy to drag him around.

But it **is** this easy, and she’s almost grateful Cobblepot made her help him dump bodies in the river back in Ye Olde Days of his career. Almost.

She gets him tucked up in bed with a mountain of blankets on him and **now** he comes to life a little, blinking rapidly at the dim lighting and scrubbing his hand across his eyes.

“Where am I?”

Confusion is…an improvement.

“You’re okay, kid.” Well. All things considered. That ankle’s half-broken, not healing right, and even ignoring the cuts and bruises and **fuck those are electrical burns what the hell** , the rasp to his breathing is probably Really Bad. “You’re safe, you…you nearly got run over, but, y’know…”

More blinking, and that expression that people get when they’re trying to make sense of things. Then, “M-Miss Marquis?”

It’s something!

“Yeah,” she says gently. “Yeah. You’re okay, kiddo, I’m gonna…I dunno, I’ll get a hold of Jim or something and he can call Batman and he’ll come get you.” Robin coughs, tries to lever himself upright and she moves to prop him up. “Okay, honey, okay, there we go…think you can take a drink? That sound good?”

“Mm-mm.” He starts trying to go back down and she lets him, tugs the comforter back up to his chin. “What happened?”

“I don’t know, kiddo. You came outta nowhere.” She wonders where her phone is. “What about somethin’ to eat, huh? Couple’a crackers, maybe?”

“Mm-mm. M’sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” Jesus Christ, he’s just a kid, no older than Charlie’s daughter. “Don’t be sorry, hon, you’re okay, you’re gonna be okay. Yeah?”

He just looks at her with wide, shiny eyes and whispers, “He’s gonna come for me.”

“Yeah, yeah, he is, he’ll be here just as soon as he can—”

“No.” He swallows, fingers creeping up to tighten around the edge of the comforter. “Not. Not Batman. J—”

His voice catches in his teeth and he squeezes his eyes shut, bunches the blankets into his arms like a makeshift teddy bear. Outside, the rain turns into hail, slamming against the patio with a determined **TAPTAPTAPTAP!**

“Shh, shh.” There’s two furrows running down from under his eyes, bruised and ragged. Fingernails, and she can **just** see those boney fingers, pale and heavy-knuckled, digging in and dragging downwards. “Don’t worry, honey, he won’t come.”

“You don’t believe that.”

Nope.

“Try to sleep, Robin,” she says. “I’m gonna call Jim, okay?”

He doesn’t answer. She goes, gets her phone out of her purse and tries to do exactly what she said she would, but Jim’s phone goes straight to voicemail.

Okay. Harvey, then…no.

No answer.

This might be a little bad. She knows, logically, that there’s plenty of cops who won’t hand the kid back over, but she doesn’t know who they are and she **does** know, because Harley had mentioned it not three weeks ago, that ‘Mistah J’s got ears all **over** this town!’

A side effect of watching people’s children sleep, she imagines.

Okay. She’ll try again in a little while. Everything’s fine. It’s Gotham, they’re busy. Maybe Batman’s there!

All the same, she triple-checks the windows, and the door, and kills all the lights before grabbing a water bottle and a box of Wheat Thins and going back in the bedroom. Robin’s not asleep. He’s still half-curled in the blankets, staring at the window with frightened eyes.

“No answer, but he’s probably busy.”

“Maybe.” He doesn’t sound convinced. “I hope so.”

“F’you want, I got these.” She holds up the water and the crackers and he shakes his head. “Try to sleep, hon, there’s probably just been a drugs bust or somethin’.”

“Don’t go.” His voice is barely audible over the hail. “Please. I’ll be quiet, I promise, just…”

“Shh.” She sits down on the other side of the bed. “This okay?”

“Yeah. T’anks.”

“Go to sleep, kiddo. It’ll be okay.”

He yawns and suddenly he’s moved and is now both burritoed in blankets and curled tightly against her side. She doesn’t know how that happened. She blinked, that’s all.

Whatever, it doesn’t matter. If it keeps him calm enough to sleep, he’s fine there. She turns her phone to vibrate and opens up the internet. This is fine. This is going to be fine.

Hopefully.

* * *

Robin doesn’t move from his blanket cocoon even after two hours. Hell, he doesn’t even move **in** the cocoon; just stays balled up with his head pressed against her side. Even asleep, he doesn’t look calm, not even close, but he does uncoil a little bit when she risks reaching down and pulling a few strands of hair away from his mouth.

Outside, the hail has only grown worse and she hopes the Joker **is** out in it, because it 

might hurt him and the mental image of a giant hailstone smacking him in the mouth is funny.

Neither Jim nor Harvey has called her back and she’s just about to try again when Robin suddenly starts coughing.

“Come on, kiddo, wake up.”

Shaking him makes him scrunch into a ball, arms over his head.

“Please—”

“Robin.” She gives him a little nudge. “Wake up, sweetheart, you gotta sit up.”

He eventually pulls himself up a little, arms falling to cradle his ribs.

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” She reaches over and picks up the water bottle, cracks the seal and winces when his eyes light up.

“S’safe?”

“Yeah, just water. You gonna try?”

“Uh-huh.” He takes it, clutches it to his chest and drains it in about forty seconds. “T’anks.”

“Sure. You hungry?”

He makes a face and mumbles, “No.”

“Okay. Try to go back to sleep, huh? You don’t look so good.”

He returns to his ball-shape, arms curled in front of his chest, and doesn’t move even when she re-tucks the comforter around him. She’s just about to text Jim instead when the phone lights up. There. All better.

“Hey, glad you got back to me.”

“What’s going on?”

“You need to send Batman to my apartment. I…I sort of nearly hit Robin with my car.”

 _“What?”_ There’s the sound of running feet in the background. “Where?”

“Not too far from Arkham. He’s…I **didn’t** hit him, anyway, but—”

“Shit.” A car door slamming. “Shit, Dove, you need to get outta there.”

“What’s going on?”

“I’m just leaving Arkham, the Joker’s God-knows-where, he murdered his way out not three hours ago.”

Well, shit.

Robin stretches out a teeny tiny bit and presses his head against her hip with a soft sigh. He’s not hearing this, then, he’s gonna calm down, he’s gonna **sleep.**

And that’s fine.

She ruffles his hair, still damp and warm and just covering a couple of contusions around his ears. Joker doesn’t know where she lives, she’s mostly sure, they’ve got a window before he tracks her down--

\--but that flash of white, earlier.

**Oh, my God.**

He could be anywhere. Could be hitchhiking, could be on the roof, could not even care. He’s unpredictable enough that he might not care, but Dove doubts it.

“Get Batman here,” is all she says. “Door’s locked, windows are locked and we’re up high anyway. The kid’s hurt and he’s sick, I don’t even know if he can walk.”

“Hrm?”

“Shh.” She presses the phone to her shoulder. “Jim just wants to meet us at the precinct, you’re not up for that. That’s all.”

“Oh.” A yawn, a wet cough and a groan of pain. “T’anks.”

“Mm-hm. We’ll see you soon, okay, Jim?”

“But—”

She hangs up on him. Robin burrows under the blankets a little more and mumbles, “I didn’t think I’d ever…I don’t even know how long I was there.”

A month and a half since Batman shattered a window, dangled Cobblepot over Main Street and demanded information he didn’t have. If Robin was missing before that, Dove doesn’t know.

“Couple'a months.” Too long. “Do you remember how you got out?”

“Th-there was a doctor. He brought her down to look at me because I couldn’t. He’d.” He swallows and tries again. “I can’t scream without coughing, an’ ‘e wanted to fix me. Said I was boring like this.” That’s not surprising. “He kidnapped her or somethin’, I don’t know, but she had to lemme go to look at me better an’ I just headbutted her and ran for it an’ she’s prob’ly dead cause’a me an’—”

“Shh, shh, baby.” She’d be dead anyway, so she wouldn’t tell. “It’s not your fault, honey, it’s not your fault.”

“Yes it is—”

 _“Robin.”_ She makes him lift his head and look at her. “It’s not your fault. Listen to me, okay? It’s not your fault. It’s not.”

Next thing she knows, she’s got an armful of shivering kid and he’s sobbing into her shirt.

“M’sorry, m’ **sorry** —”

“Shh, shh, shh.” Um. This isn’t. This is bad, what is she supposed to say, what the hell. “It’s not your fault.”

“Mm—”

“Just try to calm down, okay? Breathe with me here, c’mon.”

That’s a little difficult, what with the coughing and all, but eventually he manages to calm down, at least a bit.

“M’sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, kid. Don’t. Okay? C’mon, just lie back down—”

He shakes his head and tightens his grip and whispers, “Please.”

She’s not heartless, okay? She tried, because good employees are heartless, but she’s shit at it and the only reason Penguin keeps her is because by the time he figured it out, she had his backup e-mail passwords.

“Okay. Okay, kiddo, okay.” She moves so she’s propped against the headboard and he’s not about to knock her over and pulls the comforter up to wrap around his shoulders. “Okay, honey, you’re okay. It’s over. It’s over.” Well, providing the Joker doesn’t come knocking on the door, but he doesn’t need to know that. “Just try to sleep, okay, Robin? It’s all over.”

“You promise?”

Uh, sure?

“Yeah, I promise.”

“’Kay.” He yawns. “Night.”

It takes him about fifteen minutes to finally conk out, but conk out he does, still shivering in the blanket. Dove kind of wants a sign to inform any rampaging Batmen that he put himself here, that she hasn’t hurt him, so **please** don’t fly in and kick her in the side of the head or anything.

Hopefully someone gets here soon.

* * *

She’s startled out of an accidental sleep by a knock on the door. Jim, must be Jim. Or Harvey. Whoever.

Another knock. Okay, okay, hang **on.**

She moves the kid so he’s half-propped on pillows to help him breathe and stands up, grimacing at the **pop-pop!** from her knees. Ow. **Ow** , she regrets her life choices.

“Hrm…?”

“Shh, I’ll be right back.”

But he’s already awake, eyes alert and locked on the direction of the front door.

“Who is it?”

“Probably Jim. I’ll be right back, okay? He can carry you if he really wants you at the precinct.”

“’Kay.”

More knocking. Good **God** , Jim, give her a…damned…minute?

Jim does not have green hair. Green hair like the hair visible through the peephole. Green hair on a white face.

Shit.

She’s not home, is her first instinct. She’s not home, she’s at work or on an errand or some other non-home activity. Robin? Who’s that? Ain’t that a bird?

She’s about to run with that, tiptoe back to her bedroom and barricade the door and hope to God that he’ll go away, when the knob rattles and he sings out, “Yoo-hoo! Anybody hoooome? I seem to have lost my **dear** pet bird!”

Okay. Okay. Maybe she can get him to go away. She’s…interacted with him, a few times, at the Iceberg, and he’s always been civil. Careful wording is her one great skill, and it might work now.

Or at least buy her some time. Better, she thinks, to try and get this to go her way rather than have him break in.

She fumbles around until she comes up with the butcher knife she keeps by the door for emergencies, triple-checks the chain latch, and cracks the door.

“Hello?”

People forget, sometimes, that the Joker is a tall man. He rivals Crane, easy, but while Crane is unassuming until he wants you to look at him, the Joker is impossible to ignore. Especially up close. That grin of his is cheerful from a distance, even just from behind a bar, but now? Now it’s manic and **angry** , a chimp’s smile.

“Helloooo!” But his voice is always cheerful…up until he’s mad. “My bel-ooo-ved songbird flew away from me this evening!” His hands are still in his pockets. That means nothing. Nasty things can be found in the Joker’s pockets. “Have you seen him? I’m soooo worried.”

She’ll bet. Batman’s going to be furious when he sees the state of the kid.

“I haven’t seen anything,” she says, fakes a yawn. “I just got home a little bit ago, went to bed.”

The teeth glint. An elbow twitches. And then he **moves** , upper body lunging forward like a snake’s and a hand jamming in between the crack of the door, fingers scrambling for the chain. She throws her weight against it, slams it against his arm, and he curses at her, those purple fingers abandoning the chain in favor of her neck.

She remembers the knife. It’s heavy and clumsy in her hand, but she slashes at him anyway, tip gouging a chunk of flesh out of the back of his hand before he yanks said hand back and the door slams shut. She throws the deadbolt and rushes to the kitchen, snags a dining chair and wedges it under the knob. Outside, there’s nothing but silence.

Door as secured as it can be, she grabs another chair and retreats to the bedroom, barricades that door too. Robin’s sitting up, hands twisted into knots in his lap.

“He’s here.” God, he’s so resigned already. “He came.”

She hates to scare him, but it was impossible to miss that ruckus.

“Yeah.”

He tries to get up and can’t, ends up desperately muffling his coughs in a pillow.

“I’ll go. Just. Just can I have s-some pills o-or something, I can’t do this again, I **can’t** —”

“Shh, shh.” It’s quiet out there. That can’t be good. “Don’t be silly, it’s gonna be fine. Batman’ll be here any minute.”

He’s silent after that, eyes glued to the door. Dove rifles through her dresser until she comes up with the pistol she always carries at work and sometimes carries the rest of the time, checks the bullet count. Fully loaded. Six shots. No more security deposit, but hey…

She doesn’t notice, at first, the movement outside. The hail is still pounding down, after all. But then there’s a rhythmic **shave-and-a-hair-cut-two-bits!** against the glass.

She’ll tell the police, later, that he had a tommy gun and looked like he was going to shoot through the glass. She has no idea if that’s true; all she can think of are all those people who laughed themselves literally to death, and that like hell is she gonna be one of them.

Six shots. The first two break the glass but don’t hit him, but the next four do, driving him backwards and--

\--over. Down. Gone.

Not even one last cackle. Just a pair of fallen novelty teeth on the cement, getting knocked around by the hail.

Said hail is now trying to come in, and she wraps Robin in the comforter, guides him to the living room to lie down on the couch and locks her bedroom door, just in case. The kid’s staring at her when she comes back, shiny-eyed and a little awed.

“He’s gone?”

The fucker lives through everything.

“I think so, kid,” she says tiredly. “I think so.”

* * *

Nightwing’s the one that comes, at least at first. She’s surprised to see him; last she heard, he was over in Bludhaven, making a nuisance of himself.

“Nightwing.” God, it’s been so long since he did handstands on Penguin’s Very Expensive Barstools. He’s gotten so **big**. “Been a while, kid.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I guess so.” He crouches down, hand half-reaching towards the kid in her arms. “Jesus Christ…”

“He’s sick,” she warns. “I think broken ribs, definitely broken ankle. Lotta cuts ‘n bruises.”

“Better than the alternative.” His fingers drop against Robin’s spine. “I thought…Little Wing? C’mon, buddy, wake up. Time to go home.”

Robin doesn’t stir other than to burrow deeper into the blanket and murmur something unintelligible. Nightwing doesn’t push, just lets his hand fall flat between the boy’s shoulders.

“Where was he?”

“I found him outside of Arkham. Nearly hit him, to be honest.” She gives him a little shake. “Wake up, sweetheart, Nightwing’s here to take you home.”

“Hrm…’Wing?”

Nightwing grins, relief clear on his face.

“Hey, brat. You awake?”

“Wh’re’s B?”

“On his way.” Sure enough, there’s a **VROOM!** a block or two over. “You ready to go home?”

“Sleepy.”

“I know. I’m gonna pick you up, please don’t bite me.”

 _“Once,”_ Robin grumbles, but he doesn’t protest when Nightwing hoists him up, arms tight, and cradles him against his chest.

“I gotcha, buddy, I gotcha…Thanks, Miss Marquis. For, um. Y’know. Everything.”

She stands up, feeling things snap and crackle.

“Take him home. And be safe, both of you. I mean it.”

“T’anks,” Robin squirms a bit, one hand falling towards the floor. She gives him a smile, stands up and cracks her spine.

“Feel better sweetheart.”

He nestles against Nightwing, and then they’re gone. Jim gets up there five minutes later, wide-eyed, and says, “Holy shit, Dove, what did you _do?_ ”

Penguin does this all the time. She’s seen him do it. She shrugs, sinks back to the couch, and says, “He would’ve killed us both if I let him in. I thought he had a gun.”

Not that he needed one, as many an Arkham guard’s obituary can attest.

“Jesus Christ.”

Yeah. Jesus Christ, indeed.

THE END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is not the first time Dove’s killed a guy, hence her...not freaking out. The first (only) time was messy. This...isn’t nearly that ugly.


	6. Please...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Get it out.” Total standalone. I don’t know how we got here, it’s Whumptober, which means I don’t have to care. :)

Red Hood’s shuddering and gasping for breath, eyes unfocused and hands scrabbling for purchase. Nicole can’t exactly blame him. He fell, a-and a piece of rebar, it...it went through him.

“Okay, kid, okay, you’re gonna be okay,” Dove’s saying. “Just. Just stay real still.”

**_“Hurts--”_ **

“Sh-sh-sh. I know, baby, now try ta calm down--”

He chokes and writhes horribly, blood bubbling up over his lips and down his face. Dove tries to wipe it off, to little success.

“Please get it out--”

**“Robin,”** she says sharply, “stay still. Breathe.”

Huh?

Whatever that’s about, he does go still with a choked whimper.

“Sorry. M’sorry--”

“S’okay, sweetheart. I know it hurts, but you gotta be still. Okay? Can you do that for me?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Good boy. Now  _ stay _ still, okay? Just for a few more minutes.”

He doesn’t answer and Dove pulls Nicole a few feet away.

“Listen to me,” she says. “I’m gonna run up and get Harvey Bullock. Okay? It’s two blocks, I’ll be back in no time.”

“But--”

It’s dark. The streets are crawling with...God, she doesn’t know.  **Things** , they swarmed out of the sewers. 

“You can go, if you’d rather, but Harvey knows me, there won’t be all the rigamarole.”

Yeah, but...but Red Hood. He  **kills** people, he knows Dove and he doesn’t know Nicole and--

“You’re sure?” she asks, guiltily desperate. “Maybe…”

“He’ll die.” But… “I won’t be long, just...just watch him, okay?”

This is awful.

“Okay.”

“Good. S’gonna be fine.” 

No it’s not.

They go back to Red Hood, who’s still shuddering but, true to his word, trying to be still. He perks up a little when Dove crouches down next to him and murmurs, “Hey-hey, honey, I gotta step out for a minute, ‘kay?”

“Huh?”

“Just to get you some help. S’two blocks, I won’t be gone long.”

“N-no.”

“Hood--”

“Don’t go,  _ please-- _ ” He swipes for her hand and bites back a scream when the movement’s too much. “Please--I’ll be good, I swear--”

“I gotta, hon,” she says softly, reaching over to brush his bangs aside. “I gotta go. Not long, I  _ swear _ . Just. Just stay awake for Nicole, okay? Can you do that for me?”

“But--”

“I’ll be back as soon as I can. I promise. But you need a doctor, kid, that’s...that’s not good.”

He’s quiet for a few seconds, breathing hard through his nose, before nodding jerkilly and forcing out, “‘Kay. ‘Kay.”

“Good. You’re gonna be fine, baby, I promise, someone’ll come and get that outta you and stitch you up. Just stay  _ still _ .”

He nods again. Dove kisses his forehead and murmurs something Nicole doesn’t catch before straightening up.

“I’ll be back soon.”

And then she’s gone and Nicole’s left alone with the man that haunts her nightmares. He’s doing his best to be still and quiet, but he’s trembling and he won’t look at her. She goes closer. He can’t get to her, he can’t do anything to her, he’s going to die if help doesn’t come…

What’s she supposed to do? What if those things come back? Or something else?

What if Batman comes?

Maybe Batman can fix this. Or, like, take over for her. Or at least stay here and be a buffer. Something. Batman can do  **something** .

“H-hey.” Hood draws in a sharp breath. “F’those.  **Things** . F’they come back, go. You go. Run like hell. ‘Kay?”

“Okay.”

She crouches down as close to him as she dares and hugs her chest. It’s cold and wet and  **dark** , the only light source a flickering street lamp that’s getting dimmer by the minute. She can just see bits of Hood’s helmet-it shattered when he fell-but his face is shadowed.

“What, um. What happened?”

They’d been speed-walking somewhere-Dove said Penguin had a place around here they could hide in-and had ended up ducking through a construction skeleton because there’d been  **noises** . And Hood had just...he’d…

They hadn’t known he was there until he’d fallen. Nicole thinks she’ll remember that  **sound** , that squishy, awful sound, until the day she dies.

“Got grabbed,” he says tightly. “Carried me up there, slipped on a beam, and. Here I am.”

Scared as she is of him, she’s now more scared of whatever came out of the sewers. She sort of got to thinking Hood was, like, Jason Vorhees or something; basically unstoppable and stabby.

“I’m sorry.”

He doesn’t answer, just swallows. God, she hopes Dove gets back soon, she doesn’t know what to do…

Hood suddenly tenses, hands fisting at his sides, and presses his head against the ground. He’s gasping through clenched teeth and now that he’s moved, Nichole can see his face. Well, a little. He’s  **young** , her age, maybe.

God. What kind of city is this, to make someone like him?

His eyes are closed and his cheeks are shiny and...and Dove said to keep him awake.

“Um.” What does a girl ask the scary guy who snaps necks and shoves heads in duffle bags? “So. Um. You ever seen  _ American Gods _ ?”

Yeesh.

Hood’s silent save for that awful breathing. She’s just about to, like, say something else when he makes an interested noise.

“No.” What now? “Read the book.”

“Oh.”

“Didn’t know it. Was anythin’ else.”

“It’s new. Ish. I don’t know if it’s like the book, I’ve never read it, I just…”

“I don’t bite, kid,” he breathes. “S’okay.”

_ Kid? _ She--he isn’t--what the--

“How old are you?” Shit, she did not mean to say that. “Fuck--”

Hood huffs. It might be a laugh.

“Where’re you from.”

“Ohio.”

“Huh.” One of his hands jerks against the ground. “G-guess this’s a. A cul-ul-ul--”

He coughs. It’s wet and  **wrong** and it makes his whole body jerk against the rebar. She wants him to stop, she wants to run away, she wants to go back in time and decide to go literally anywhere but here.

What is she supposed to do? She doesn’t think shushing him is going to go over well. She doesn’t think anything she tries is going to go over well.

The horrible coughing finally stops and Hood goes slack, gasping and spitting blood. Nichole inches closer and, when nothing bad happens, figures she’ll ask. She’s out of other ideas.

“Why did Dove call you Robin?”

“Old habits die hard,” he says thickly. He’s shaking again and when Nichole really  **looks** , she realizes that he’s crying.

“She’ll be back soon,” she says awkwardly. He doesn’t answer and she quits bugging him.

It’s maybe five minutes later that lantern beams-the really bright ones from camper lanterns-cut through the dark.

“--back this way--”

“--fuckin’ town--”

“You’re telling me--Nichole!”

Oh, thank God.

“See?” She turns. Hood’s blinking against the rain. “Look.”

Now that there’s light, she can see him. He’s young, yeah, but scarred; the ‘J’ on his face (his initial? Someone else’s?) is particularly jarring.

…

Oh, jeeze, he’s not gonna kill her for seeing him without his mask, right?

“Hood!” Harvey Bullock’s a big, obnoxious asshole who is always eating something. He’s not Nicole’s favorite person, but he’s here now and Hood brightens a little-very little-when he lumbers into view. “Jesus, kid, you...you don’t look so good.”

“Wh-what’re you doing here?” Hood tries to  **move** , raises his head and part of his chest before thudding back with a moan. “You gotta. Those things--”

“We got ‘em, Hood. Turns out they don’t do so well against flamethrowers.” WHAT. “Now quit movin’.”

“But--”

“We’re dealing with ‘em. Relax.” Bullock adjusts his hat and the toothpick that’s almost always in his mouth jumps. “They’re on the run. You Bats ain’t the only competent people in Gotham.”

To hear Mr. Cobblepot go on, they sort of are. Every so often he’ll get on a tangent about how it  **used** to be easy to run a respectable racket in this town, pay off half the cops and make sure the other half was dumb as a box of rocks, and then Goddamn Batman showed up and ruined everything.

“Harvey…” Dove says tiredly. Nichole doesn’t jump. She doesn’t. She just didn’t hear her come up behind her, that’s all. “Be nice.”

“Just sayin’.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know. How’re you holding up, honey?”

Hood blinks a few times, looking confused, before swallowing and forcing out, “M’wake.”

“I see. That’s good. You gotta stay that way, okay? Just for a little bit longer?”

“Mm-hm.”

“Good. Help’ll be here any minute, I promise. Won’t it, Harvey?”

“Yup,” Bullock says, toothpick jumping again. “Any minute.”

Hood just breathes, eyes fixed on the rebar jutting out of him, and reaches up to cling loosely to Dove’s jacket.

“You okay, Nichole?”

No. No, she’s not, this went from bad to worse and…

And she wants her Mama.

“I’m okay,” she lies. “You know.”

Nobody looks like they buy it, but now the ambulance is here and the lights are making the blood look...there’s just so  **much** of it, on him and on the ground and on the rebar. Hood flinches at the light, eyes squeezing shut, and all of a sudden he just goes  **limp** , fingers slipping off Dove’s jacket.

“Shit--”

“Here!”

“Jesus, what happened--”

“S’that the Red Hood--”

He’s breathing, she registers vaguely as the EMTs urge everyone away from him. He’s still breathing.

He’s still breathing.

THE END


	7. I've Got You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Carrying.

Gotham isn’t sure what to do with Red Hood and his…little…group.

Bats? They’re used to bats. These guys? Nobody’s sure if they’re the good guys, the bad guys, or in some awkward middle ground.

Leslie doesn’t care. It’s her job to remain one of the few true neutrals in Gotham; mobsters, Rogues, Bats, she’ll treat them all the same.

Doesn’t make her less alarmed when Hood’s boys swarm her clinic, one of them cradling their leader in his arms. The Red Hood himself is bloody and trembling, a rough field bandage wound around his chest and his helmet gone--helmet. Gone?

Wait.

She can’t see his face, thanks to his carrier’s bear leg of an arm, but she can hear him panting for breath. He breathes wrong and chokes, gasps out a desperate,  **“Please—”**

She knows that boy, knows him well, but he was…Joker had…

_ “Jason?” _

“Mm…” He shifts, arm slipping from his stomach, and presses his head against his carrier’s shoulder with a whimpered, “Hurts…”

“Shh, boss, we’re gonna get ya some help,” the big guy soothes, rubbing thick fingers gently against Jason’s ribs, then narrows his eyes at her.  **“Fix him.”**

“This way. What happened?”

“Crocodile guy,” another one, this one wearing a white jacket, says. “We split up to try and herd him outta the sewers. He put up a fight.”

Jason moans when he’s laid down on the table, but he opens his eyes when she taps his cheek.

“Hey, Doc,” he breathes. “We g-gotta. Gotta stop meeting this way.”

Does Bruce know?

“Hold still--you have medical experience, son?”

“Combat medic for seven years and counting, civilian trauma surgeon for two years before that.” He shrugs. “You were closer, or I’d have handled this myself.”

Okay, then.

Jason’s a mess. When she gets him stripped out of his armor (is that duct tape? Really?), he’s got three ragged gashes running from his shoulder to his hip. Combat Medic grimaces.

“Damn it…the hell did you do, kick him in the head?”

“Uh-huh.” That…that’s Jason in a nutshell. “S’Croc—”

“We sedated him and dumped him at the GCPD on the way here,” Combat Medic says. “Only one hurt is you.”

“Good.” He swallows and closes his eyes again. “S’good. Mm. M’gonna sleep, ‘kay?”

“That’s fine, Jason,” Leslie says gently. “You did good.”

He might be bigger, more worn out, but that provokes the same shy smile it did when he was Robin. Then he’s out cold, soft gasps the only obvious sign of life.

“Croc?” she asks Combat Medic. He nods and jerks his head towards the door.

“Out, you’re in the way.”

The big man, armor bright red across the chest, shrugs and steps out. Leslie breathes a sigh of relief and only feels a little guilty for it.

“What happened?”

“We found him like this,” Combat Medic says. “Thought that thing was gonna eat him. You were closer, so here we are.”

“Waylon? He’s been…known to engage in cannibalism from time to time.”

Combat Medic grimaces and steps over to the sink to wash up.

“No offense, but this city is a disaster.”

“It didn’t used to be.”

Joker had been the harbinger. He’d come, with his laughing gas and his exploding chattery teeth, and more had followed.

They strip Jason down the rest of the way. He’s a mess of cuts and bruises and scars, but the only major injuries are those gashes.

And they’re. They’re bad. They’re deep and parts of them were made wider by what she figures was Waylon picking him up. The bleeding’s sluggish, at least, and when she starts trying to clean him up he doesn’t so much as flinch.

The ‘J’ on his face is the most obvious sign of what Joker did to him, but there’s other marks. Ragged gashes that she can pin to a crowbar (favorite weapon of Gotham’s street thugs). Smaller marks the size and spacing of barbed wire. Knife marks. Burn scars. A couple of ribs that didn’t heal right.

She’s sure there’s more. She doesn’t want to know.

Combat Medic gives her the Eye.

“Can I help you?”

“We brought him here because he swore it was safe,” he says, tongue moving a wad of gum to his right cheek. “You hurt him, you won’t live to regret it.”

“Son, you can help or you can leave. I don’t have time for this.”

He snorts, gives her a wry smile.

“Fine.”

* * *

A blond man wearing a tattered beret appears to be their secondary leader-when she and Combat Medic-Mark, he’d said his name was-step out, he’s the one that steps forward.

“Well?”

“He’ll probably be alright.” If she has anything to say about it. “I’d like to keep him overnight.”

His eyes go to Mark, who nods. Humph.

“Fine,” Beret says. “You’re sure--”

“Pretty sure,” she says. The tension bleeds out of the room. “You can go see him if you’re quiet and don’t wake him.”

Not that it matters, it turns out. The anesthesia’s starting to wear off (it never did work that well on him), and he’s semiconscious. Hurting, clearly-there’s a crease between his eyebrows that he always used to get as a kid-but he’s awake.

“Ow.”

“You dumbfuck,” Mark snaps. “Serves you right.”

“Mm-hm.” The smile he manages is loopy and sweet and for a moment she sees him at thirteen, recovering from a run-in with the Mad Hatter. “Knew you’d get there.”

“ **Before** you got eaten?” Mark takes a deep breath. “We’ll talk about it when you don’t look like you’ve got tweety birds flying around your head.”

Jason huffs a laugh and worms further under the sheets.

“Don’ have tweety birds.”

One of the others, a man maybe a little older than Bruce, comes up and ruffles his hair.

“Go to sleep, boss. You look kinda green still.”

“Croc’s greener.”

He’s going to be fine.

THE END


	8. Where'd Everybody Go?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Abandonment. Or, a little something on the psychological side.

The thunder is what wakes him, a sharp, sudden  **CRACK!** that has him falling off the mattress, ducking for cover, and--

\--oh. Storm. Right. It’s been moving in all day, heavy and thick, electricity crackling in the air. It’s just the storm.

Breathing hard, hand pressed against his chest, Jason gets to his feet, registers that Mom’s not here. She sent him off to bed earlier, said she’d already let him stay up past his bedtime, and he’d read the lines around her eyes. Too long, it had been too long, she was hurting. So he’d kissed her on the cheek and gone, like she said.

But now it’s late, it has to be, there’s not enough traffic for anything else. So where is she?

“Mom?” His voice is small in the dark. “Where are you?”

Kitchen, maybe? A flash of lightning illuminates the room and she’s not here. Just him, the mattress, and the old picture that Mom keeps in here, the one with her an’ Dad an’ Jason on his first day of school, when they were poor but moving up, when he never dreamed he’d have to drop out before fifth grade.

He hates it, but she loves it, so it stays.

“Mom?”

No answer. She’s probably passed out somewhere, then. But…

She’s careful. He knows that, she’s promised to be careful. Just enough to make the pain go away, she explained, the first time she sent him out of the apartment. And Mom doesn’t lie to him, not ever. 

He checks the kitchen first. Nothing, not even a sticky note about stepping out. Did she decide to take a bath? She does that, sometimes, after.

The bathroom door is closed. There’s no light underneath, but when he checks the kitchen switch he finds that the power’s out. Could be the storm, could be no bill payment. He’s not sure.

He rubs a hand across raw, itchy eyes and knocks on the bathroom door.

“Mom?”

Mom doesn’t answer. He rattles the knob and the door swings open, but not…not all the way.

“Mom?”

There’s another flash of lightning and he sees an arm, limp and awkwardly splayed over the tiles.

**No no no no--**

“Mom!”

He pushes the door open just enough to slip inside, drops to his knees and shakes her bony shoulders. The smell of vomit hits him a second later, hot and acidic in his nostrils, but he doesn’t care because Mom’s not wakin’ up why isn’t she wakin’ up--

“Mom, please--”

Her skin’s cold under his fingers and he shakes her again. Her head lolls.

Lightning turns the room bright white. She’s. Her. Her eyes are open, they’re open and  **staring** under the sink where the sticky trap with dead bugs on it is--

“Mom!” No. No, no, she’s careful, she can’t be-- “Mom, wake up! You gotta wake up, come on!”

Her head lolls again, red strands falling into the yellow bile under her cheek. She’s not blinking, she’s not  **moving.**

“Mama?” She’s gotta wake up, she’s gotta… “Mom, please…wake up, please wake up, don’t leave me here…”

He pulls her out of the puddle, at least, and curls up against her back, hands knotted in her shirt and forehead pressed between her shoulders. There’s no warmth, no comforting  **ba-tum** of her heart. No nothing.

It’s only when there’s another  **CRACK!** of thunder that he realizes he’s started crying.

THE END


	9. For the Greater Good

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Combo of ‘run!’ and the alternate prompt of ‘stitches’. The ‘Gloria’ here is indeed Gloria Stanson from *that* issue.

Jason sinks onto his bathroom floor, breath stabbing through clenched teeth, and crawls into his shower. The tiles feel like ice against his skin. He has no idea how he got back here other than,  **sheer dumb luck.**

His arms give out and he goes down, face mashed against the drain. He needs. Needs to strip down, needs to stop the bleeding, needs to help himself. Heaven knows he’s always had to help himself, that was a lesson he learned early and well. But.  **Ow.**

_ She looks like Gloria. And isn’t that wild, he hasn’t thought of her in years an’ years, but she looks like Gloria, looks so damn familiar. Maybe it’s her hair. Maybe it’s the screams. Maybe it’s the bruised, bloody face. Maybe it’s the way that sorry bastard’s got her pinned down on the bed with an arm across her throat and his pants half-off his ass. _

Jason breathes. Pushes himself onto his back, tiles pressing into his spine and into his tailbone and into bruises from two nights back. He’s okay. He’ll be okay. He has to be.

_ He couldn’t save Gloria, and he’ll hate himself and Bruce and the whole damn system for that until the day he dies, but he can save this woman. History won’t repeat itself, not tonight, not here. _

Slowly, carefully, he works his body armor off. Feels worse than it is; a lucky knife wound that reopened stitches near his hip. Well, reopened and cut deep, but not so deep that he can’t fix this himself. It hurts, though, and the blood’s going onto the tiles and honestly, it’s just in a bad spot, a spot that hurts him to twist to.

Like he’s got much of a choice, but still.

_ He swings through the window, figures he’ll apologise for the damage later, and slams into the man boots-first. He hits the wall, gets driven through it in a shower of cheap plaster by Jason’s weight and momentum. The woman screams and Jason turns. There’s his mistake. _

**_“Run!”_ **

Shower, he thinks. Clean up. Then stitches, then bed.

Getting his boots off is harder. The pants? Take five minutes, because he keeps stopping to try and breathe. But eventually his clothes are all in a wad outside the shower and he manages to sit up enough to turn on the water before going back down.

_ Fair is fair, the guy’s no weakling. He pulls himself out of his kitchen sink, cursing, and the next thing Jason knows, he’s lashing out with a meat cleaver. Gets lucky, too, goes through the armor and  _ **_straight_ ** _ to the still-tender stitches. But it doesn’t matter. Not-Gloria’s made a break for it; the bedroom’s empty. _

The warm water-crappy pressure be damned-feels  _ wonderful _ on his aching body. Honestly, the poor pressure is probably in his best interest right now. He moves as much as he dares, so his hair’s not near the drain, and reaches up to scrub a shaking hand across his face.

_ She’s safe, and Jason’s fucking pissed. He looks at his side-his bleeding, throbbing side-and back at the man, well aware that the helmet makes him look like something out of a slasher film. _

_ “Do it again,” he says, closes the distance between them. “I can take everything you dish out. Wanna see if you can say the same?” _

_ “Jesus--” _

_ “Would you like to run? Beg for your miserable life?” This time, the attempted attack is clumsy. He’s too close for it to be effective; the guy’s arm barely goes back before Jason’s got him by the throat. “Go on. Give me one good reason to let you walk away.” _

_ “It was a game! Just a game, I swear--” _

**_“Don’t lie to me.”_ **

_ “God,  _ **_please--_ ** _ ” _

_ Jason rips him away from the sink and slams him to the floor, boot on his chest hard enough to crack ribs. The cleaver goes skittering off under a cabinet. _

_ “I’m sure she asked you to stop. Much you’re asking me now, huh?” He leans forward, feels bones creak. “Funny thing, I care about that as much as you.” _

_ “No-no-!” _

**_BLAM!_ **

He has no idea how long he’s on the shower floor, but eventually he manages to clean himself up and get out, wrap up in a towel and get out his first-aid kit. This’ll scar, now, but, well...who cares? Just another one for the road map, whoop-dee-fuckin’-dee. ‘Sides, he listened to Alfred,  **watched** Alfred, so it might not be as bad as it could be. Alfred does neat work.

When he was a kid, he’d hated stitches. It had freaked him out, to watch gaping wounds just get thinner and smaller like a hole in his jacket. But he’d insisted, wanted to learn how to do it right. He’ll be honest, though, he’d hated getting them right up to the day Joker got him.

Funny thing, stitches aren’t nearly as scary as watching a brand move closer and closer to your face while you lie helpless to do anything about it. Who’d have thought.

There. Not quite as neat as Alfred’s, sure, but they could be worse.

He snags an apple juice and a handful of oatmeal cookies on his way to his bed. He’ll have to get up and brush his teeth, but...later. Let him have this, huh? Let him just  _ rest _ , just for a few minutes,  _ please _ .

Ahh, that’s the stuff. Firm* mattress, soft blankets, cushy pillows. The one good picture he has of his mom-just her, no Willis in sight-smiles at him from his dresser, next to his old Robin bear. He’ll get up and brush in a few minutes, but for now...for now he just wants to  _ be _ . Just for a few more minutes.

THE END

*As someone with joint pain: SQUISHY MATTRESSES ARE THE ENEMY. I slept on a featherbed for about four days and could hardly walk. NEVER AGAIN.


	10. They Look So Pretty When They Bleed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blood loss. Jason Fabok apparently thinks that our Jason does indeed look pretty when bleeding. Magnificent bastard. (This has nothing to do with that, I just thought I’d point it out.) Anyways, timelines are for cowards and I don’t know when this is and I really don’t care anyway. :)

He’s hurting, he’s hurting and he wants…he wants his mom, he wants Bruce, he wants this to be over.

And it  **is** over. The clown’s dead, head rolled behind a dumpster and the rest of him heavy and limp on the ground. But Jason…

Dove’s tryin’, really she is, to keep him from bleedin’ out, but he knows. He knows he’s gonna die, short of a miracle.

Or a curse. He can  **rest** now.

“Stop.” He drags in a ragged breath and tries to force his eyes open. It’s dark. Everything’s dark, ‘cept for the purple of Joker’s suit, lit up by streetlights. “Please.”

“Shh--”

“Please.” Talking hurts, it hurts so much. “Please. I-I want…” He swallows, tasting blood. “I want my mom. I wanna see my mom.”

Her hands tense, palms flat against the hole under his ribs, and he nearly misses the whispered, “Okay, honey. Okay.”

He swallows again, pain leaving a swelling in his throat and a numbness in his head.

“T’anks, M-m-mmm—”

He chokes, red warmth swimming up his throat and over his lips. His head’s turned sideways (away from  **him** ) to help him spit it out.

“Dove, kid.” Her voice is shaking. “S’been long enough, I think.”

S-s’only fair, then.

“Jason.” Her hands start to ease up and he panics because that bastard doesn’t stay dead  **he doesn’t** ‘n-- “Please s-s-stay, I don’…not with  **him** , m’scared **—** ”

Scared to die, scared Joker’ll get back up. Aren’t they the same?

“Sh-sh-sh, sweetheart.” She moves and he’s pulled back, a few inches away from the purple blur and into warmth. “I’m right here, okay? I gotcha. I gotcha. Just close your eyes, it’s okay.”

He can still see the purple. He presses his head against her arm and it vanishes.

God, he can’t breathe, he can’t breathe ‘n he wants his mom but--

**Bruce.** He’s sorry, he didn’t mean, he never wanted…they had time, didn’t they? They had time.

“Dove?”

“What is it, sweetheart?”

“W-would you…” He swallows, tasting rust. “Tell Batman. M’sorry. Tell ‘im m’sorry.”

“Shh, Jason.” Huh? “Tell him yourself. He’s here.”

**Dad.**

He pulls his head up. He can barely see Bruce, but he can hear him well enough. 

“B.” God, he hopes he can make himself heard, he’s just so tired… “You  **came** .”

Bruce crouches down and Jason drops his head back against Dove’s arm, away from the purple blur near the dumpster. It’s not cold anymore. Bruce is here and he can  **see** him now, kinda, because he’s leaning over to cup his head.

There’s worst last things to see.

He closes his eyes to the purple, to the rain, to  **everything** , and clings to the quickly-fading sensation of Bruce’s hand-warm and solid-pressed against his face.

“M’sorry,” he breathes, because he needs to  **know** . “Dad.”

“Shh—”

Ha. Joke’s. Joke’s on him, that took the last of his voice.

What little grip he had on Dove’s arm loosens and then, just like that, it’s dark.

THE END


	11. Psych 101

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Struggling, a bit of crying. Hell, a dash of defiance too. For fun. >-)

“Stop right where you are.” Crane’s voice, cold and commanding, halts Bruce in his tracks. He only sounds like that when he’s got leverage,  **good** leverage. Hostage. “Thank you.”

Crane himself is, as of right now, not present. He’d holed himself up in some roadside haunted house (why, oh why, do people insist on roadside haunted houses in Gotham?) and turned it into a very real house of horrors. By the time Bruce tracked him down (by the time it became apparent that he’d escaped at all), he’d had ample time to set up traps and create no small amount of fear toxin.

Bruce had avoided the traps, made his way to a room that looks like it did indeed start life as a mad scientist’s laboratory. There’s tables everywhere, and several mini-fridges, and canisters, and part of the room has been sealed off and turned into a little viewing chamber. He’s sure that reinforced glass is new. The body on the floor is also certainly genuine.

The room is empty. In fact, barring the body in there, Bruce hasn’t seen signs of life at all. He knows Crane has to be here, because he’s using the intercom, but he hasn’t even stumbled across one of the stray coffee mugs that usually populate the man’s hideouts. Nor, for that matter, has he seen any sign of Richardson.

They’ve been here for too long, had too much time to prepare.

“If you’ll turn your attention to my operating room,” Crane continues, “I think you’ll be very interested.”

Hostage. Bruce has handled Scarecrow Hostage Situations before. It’s always, always a matter of keeping him talking.

The little door behind the glass shrieks open and Richardson pushes a wheelchair into the room. She’s easy enough to see in the gloom, in that white coat, but whoever’s in the chair has a bag over their head and all he can be sure of is that they’re an adult.

Richardson waves cheerily at him, parks the chair so it’s facing out, and crosses to an ice chest sitting in the far corner.

“Now, what do I...not this...ah!” Sickly green light floods the little chamber and Bruce fights a sudden surge of panic. That looks like Jason. Surely it isn’t,  **surely** it isn’t, but the man in the chair is the same height and build. He’s in an orange Arkham jumpsuit, but that means nothing, nothing at all… “ _ There _ we are. Say hello to your lost little Robin, Batman.”

**No.**

Richardson saunters back over, ice chest in hand, and reaches over to tug the bag free.

Crane wasn’t lying, or mistaken. That is Jason, restrained by zip-ties and handcuffs and what appear to be bike locks. There’s dried blood on his face, but he’s conscious and clearly enraged; when Richardson gets too close, he tries to bite her. She snatches her fingers back but doesn’t retaliate.

Bruce’s worry level rises. Richardson’s always been volatile. This is going to be bad.

“Let him go, Crane.”

“Why would I do that?” Crane sounds amused. “It took us  _ far _ too much effort to subdue him. Don’t play dumb, Batman, it doesn’t suit you.”

Richardson looks at Jason before advancing on him, this time with a strip of cloth in her hands. He squirms and tries to keep her off, fairly successfully, until she sighs, gives Bruce a ‘what choice have I?’ look, and smashes a pipe into the back of his head.

It doesn’t knock him out, but it stuns him enough for her to gag him. This isn’t the first time Bruce has seen one of his children treated like this, but that doesn’t make it easier to swallow, and it certainly doesn’t mean she’s going to get off the hook when he catches up with her. She smiles, pats his cheek, and retreats to rummage through the ice chest.

“We will be leaving in a few minutes,” Crane continues. “You will be staying here.”

“You won’t be going far.”

“Oh, I think we will. You’ve seen, I’m sure, what my newest formula is capable of.”

Bruce has. True to form, Crane has escalated again, to a fast-acting, hard-hitting horror that has left several dozen people dead, either of self-injury, attack by the afflicted, or an outright heart attack. Prior antidotes are useless, won’t even lessen the severity, and Bruce is having a devil of a time crafting a new one; the compound leaves the bloodstream remarkably fast, making it difficult to pin down at all.

“Don’t you  **dare--** ”

“I give the orders here, not you. Now. Observe the syringe.”

Richardson draws it out of the ice chest. It’s a massive, old-fashioned thing that looks straight out of a movie and also looks big enough and strong enough to pierce even Croc’s scaly hide. Richardson holds it up, gestures at it a little like she’s playing at being on a game show.

“Observed? Good. Now, in light of our...long relationship, my current formula is  **not** inside that syringe. What  **is** inside is an early version of my current formula. It was...really, it was fifty-fifty as to whether it would produce the results I wanted, or if it would cause death within five minutes. Such is science…”

Jason’s gone still in the chair, hands clenched. If looks could kill, Richardson-and possibly Crane, at this point-would be dead on the floor.

“Now. Either of these results, to you, is unacceptable. Yes? So.” Bruce can just  _ see _ that smug smile slithering over his face. “You can chase after us, possibly leaving your son here to die alone and afraid, or you can try to help him. Your choice.”

“Crane, I’m  **warning** you--”

“Kitty.”

**“No!”**

The glass shudders but doesn’t break when he tries to come through it, and by then it’s too late; Richardson’s quick with that needle, and there’s nothing he or Jason can do to keep her from injecting the contents into Jason’s neck. She gives Jason a peck on the cheek, waves at Bruce, and sprints out the door.

Bruce resorts to blowing a hole in the glass. It takes three attempts, but he gets in all the same.

Jason’s still,  **too** still. Bruce pulls the gag out of his mouth, but he cannot,  **will** not, have Jason tearing his own throat out. The restraints stay, even if it’s killing him inside.

“Jay. Jason.” He’s breathing too fast. “Look at me.”

He lifts his head, just a little, but doesn’t speak. He’s not looking at Bruce, either, he’s looking behind him, eyes already tinged a yellowish-green.*

“No,” he breathes. “No, no…”

“It’s not real.” That has never worked, not any time, ever, but he needs to say  **something** . “It’s not real, Jay, focus on my voice.”

“Get away from me!” He recoils and Bruce grabs the chair to keep him from tipping backwards. “Get away!”

“Jason, no one’s going to hurt you--”

“Get away from me-- _ please _ \--”

“Shh.” Bruce rolls him closer to the wall and holds his shoulders. “Shh. Jason, listen. Listen. No one is going to hurt you, Jay, but you have to try and breathe--”

Jason jerks, restraints creaking and rattling when he does, and when Bruce reaches up to cup the back of his head he yanks away.

“Please, no,” he begs, voice cracking and raw. “Please, I’ll do whatever you want, just. Just don’t do this, don’t  **do** this--”

“Jason--”

Jason throws his head back and  **screams** , loud and long enough that Bruce is genuinely worried he’ll do some sort of permanent damage to his throat. As awful as it is, it’s not new, and he can push aside the panicking father for the moment. But then the scream cuts off and Jason just slumps forward, gasping and sobbing.

“Hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts…”

“Jay,” he says softly. “Jason. You’re all right. You’re all right.”

Jason gulps for air before trying to curl in on himself, tears streaming down his face and chin before disappearing into his collar. Bruce risks uncuffing him first, and when he doesn’t try to hurt himself, goes to work on the bike locks. Jason just sits there, trembling like a leaf and jerking his head side-to-side like he’s been bur--

\--oh.

Oh, God.

Joker. Joker did this to him, and Bruce let him.

“I’m sorry, Jason,” he murmurs. “I’m so sorry.”

The last of the locks falls away and Jason tumbles from the chair and into Bruce’s arms. He’s shaking and very warm, but he’s not trying to hurt himself-or Bruce, for that matter-which means that they can proceed to the Batmobile.

“Come on, Jay. We’re going home.”

Jason is not at all cooperative; he refuses to move his legs or even straighten up, and Bruce ends up half-carrying, half-dragging him to the car. He pools into the seat and doesn’t fight back when he’s strapped in. He’s still choking on tears and mucus and murmuring, barely intelligibly now, “Hurts it hurts it  **hurts** .”

“There we go, Jay-lad. We’re going home now.” Straight home, where Alfred can take him, and then Bruce is going to get  **them** . “Just breathe, Jay, you’re all right, it’s not real.”

Jason does  **not** like being in the dark; even when Bruce switches on the little lights he has back there, his quiet sobs turn into frantic screams and pleas to get out.

“No-no-!”

He can’t get out of that seat. Bruce has made sure of that; those seats were designed with Harley ‘wanna see me slip outta these cuffs?’ Quinn in mind. But that doesn’t make it easier to listen to him try, and when he finally gives up, maybe five minutes from the cave, it’s worse.

“Why won’t you just kill me?”

_ Oh, Jason, no. _

Maybe it’s cowardly, but he tells himself it’s an invasion of Jason’s privacy, to listen to this any further. And that’s why he mutes the feed. He can still check on him with the camera, but…

He can’t listen to this. He just can’t.

THE END

*Fear toxin: Year One states that it can leave a green ring around the cells, I’ve decided it can do the same to the eyes.


	12. Nightmares

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate prompt; I’m not feeling ‘broken’ today.

Jason crawls under his covers, body aching, and feels Lemon squirm up beside him to plunk her head on his pillow. He tried giving her her own pillow, but, well...she has to share. Sometimes she likes to wedge her nose up against the back of his neck. It’s...it’s a special sort of love.

Mercifully, she doesn’t feel the need to snuffle his neck all night long tonight; she huffs and rolls over so her spine is against his spine, and that’s the end of that. Good.

He’ll be honest, at first, he was terrified to have her in his bed. What if he woke up in a panic and hurt her somehow, or, like, hurt her in his sleep? But as the weeks went by, that faded and was replaced by security. He can take care of himself. He knows he can; there’s a reason criminals that have happily fought Batman turn tail and run at the sight of him. But that’s as Red Hood, that’s out there. In here, he’s just Jason, and Jason...Jason has been a victim too many times to ever really feel  **safe** .

But Lemon’s big. And scary. And he knows she’s a big baby, but she’ll warn him if something comes and most people don’t wanna fuck with her anyway.

So yeah, there’s something comforting about Lemon’s giant, drooly self smashed up against him. Makes it easier to fall asleep.

He must sleep some, because he blinks and the clock’s gone from three-oh-two to...to...what  **does** that say? Four? Seven? What time is it?

He blinks to try and clear the blurriness from his eyes, but it doesn’t help. S’he sick? Maybe he’s sick or something.

He struggles out of bed, feeling dizzy, and shuffles towards his bathroom. Or. Towards the direction his bathroom is in; his bedroom seems endless, the fluffy rug stretching on and on under his feet.

He must be sick. It’s the only explanation.

Somehow (when?), he’s in his bathroom, leaning over the sink. The light hurts, and his eyes are still so blurry. He can’t even make out the color of his soap.

“Jay?”

Mom? Why is Mom here? Not that he’s complaining; if he’s sick, there’s really nothing better than having your mom around.

“Be out in a sec, Mama,” he says, or...thinks he says. His voice sounds funny to his ears, like he’s talking underwater.

“Jay, are you okay?”

“I…”

He has no warning before he throws up, grainy bile spattering into his sink and splashing onto his hands. And it keeps coming up, even as Mom steps into the bathroom and rubs his back.

“Oh,  _ baby _ ,” she says, in that special tone she always used when he was sick. “Poor baby.”

He just slumps forward, sludge spilling out between his lips, and finally has nothing left to give up. Mom rubs his back and dabs his face with a freezing washcloth.

“Rinse your mouth.”

Yeah. Yeah, he’ll just...what happened?

He does as he’s told (or he must, it just...did he?) and straightens up. Mom’s still behind him, palm flat between his shoulders.

“Back to bed, baby, come on.”

Where is his bed? He can’t see a damn thing outside of the bathroom, it’s all just dark.

“I don’t feel good--”

“Shh. Come on.”

‘Kay. ‘Kay.

He wants to. Honest. But something about the dark is screaming  **no no no** and he can’t make his feet carry him out of the safe, white,  **bright** bathroom. 

“Oh, come on, Jay,” Mom says, cajoling like she used to be when he was real little and scared of the shower drain. “It’s okay. Look.”

She can’t go, either. Something’s wrong, it’s not safe.

“Mama--” She walks right by him and into the dark, and...and vanishes. “Mom!”

“Come on out, sweetheart,” she calls from somewhere up ahead. “It’s okay, come to Mama, come on.”

Huh?

He doesn’t want to. He’s scared. But...but she said it’s okay, and…

He doesn’t feel good.

There’s a light, just down the hall. He really doesn’t like the light; it’s orange and flickering. But it just shows Mom, standing a few feet away. She’s not looking at him. It occurs to him that she’s lost weight, that she looks...looks real frail. She’s not sick again, is she?

He goes to her. She said it was okay. Up close, he can see she’s dyed her hair blonde. Huh. S’weird, kinda. She had it red, when he was a baby, but then she’d let it go back to black. She’s never had it blonde.

“That’s a good boy.”

The light is coming closer. They need to get back in the bathroom, it’s the only safe place here,  **something is wrong** .

“Mom, we need to move.”

“Oh, don’t be a goose.” Why won’t she look at him? “Come on.”

“Mom--”

That’s not a light. That’s a branding iron, with Joker holding it.

“No--”

He tries to turn and run, but Mom grabs him,  **screeching** , and he sees her face for the first time since she got here.

She’s. She’s falling apart, skull peeking through gray, ragged flesh that’s peeling off. She doesn’t have eyes anymore and  **something** is moving back inside her mouth, something with legs.

“Mama--”

He can’t move. He can’t even struggle. All he can do is watch Joker advance on him all over again, laughing.

“Mama,  _ please _ \--”

His face is wet.

His face is  **wet** , and slimy, and it smells.

He’s breathing hard. The wetness moves to his exposed throat and--

Lemon. Lemon is slobbering all over him and whining a little. He scrubs his face with a corner of the sheet and rolls over. Four-oh-nine. 

**God.**

“M’okay, sour girl,” he breathes. “M’okay. M’okay.”

THE END


	13. Shot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not feeling today’s main prompt either. Meh. But hey, look, it’s canon!

The little voice in the back of his head says he could run. He’s not restrained. His ankle’s healed enough to shamble, at least. Objectively, he sees a way out; headbutt the Joker. Hit him again to make sure he’s down.  **Run.**

But that little voice is what’s gotten him in trouble before. It’s the one that told him to keep fighting back, to keep spitting obscenities and insults, and those ultimately led to  **pain** . Electricity. Beatings. Waterboarding. So he ignores it.

Robin’s an idiot, anyway.

He breathes, looks at the tiles through bleary, tired eyes. The chair’s uncomfortable, but here he was put and here he will stay. It’s better, safer, to do as he’s told.

Joker putters around, muttering about cords and connections and  _ used to be red to red, now it’s red to blue and dark red to red and OH it’s just so COMPLICATED anymore!  _ He ignores him. Nobody’s speaking to him, so he’s to keep his mouth shut.

Even if he would like to know what’s going on.

“There we are!”

He risks looking up. Just a peek. Joker has a camera set up in front of him. Huh. He returns to looking at the tiles, wonders if it’s okay to move his hair out of his eyes; a strand’s poking him right in the corner of the left one.

No, he decides. No moving. He swallows down the irritation with the strand.

A small  **beep!** says the camera is on. Joker claps. He doesn’t flinch. Not anymore. Not after one too many times of...regretting it.

“Have you got something to tell the nice man, Jason?”

Oh. It’s time.

Joker had said, at...some point in the maybe-recent past, that he was going to send a nice tape to Batman and then all his misery would be over. He doesn’t remember exactly when that was, and he doesn’t know what’s going to happen now, and he doesn’t care. He sees an end to his pain, and that’s enough.

“My name is Jason Todd.”

“Who do you hate?”

_ You _ , he wants to say, but that always,  **always** results in excruciating pain. He knows the answer. It’s not entirely wrong, either.

“Batman.”

“ _ Excellent! _ Of  _ course _ you do.” Yup. “Did ya get that, Bats? Kid’s not yours anymore. He’s  _ mine. _ ” His cheek burns in agreement. “Mine, mine, mine. To do with as I wish.” Joker strolls over, throws an arm around his shoulders and rubs a soft, purple thumb over the skin under the brand before sauntering back towards the camera. “Hey, I never asked. Who is the big, bad, Bat? His name.  **_Tell me._ ** ”

Joker has asked. He has never, ever, answered. The little voice screams at him not to do it now and for the first time in months, they’re in agreement.

_ Good luck tracking down Willis Todd _ , he thinks, a little wryly.  _ Fucker. _

“Of course, sir. It’s--”

**BLAM!**

The bullet knocks him out of the chair, sends him sprawling onto the tiles. Hurts. It  **hurts** .

He has some vague notion of Joker coming over to him, but he can’t even breathe, it hurts so bad, and…

And it’s over. It’s finally, finally over.

THE END


	14. Is Something Burning?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did consider ‘branding’, I’ll admit, but ultimately, that sequence was done so well-the fact that you only hear it happen and have no idea what’s going on until later? Cinema-that I figured it was best to leave it alone. SO we get ‘fire’. Also fun: The Vote is canon in the novelisation. :) I wish I were kidding.

Jason’s scream breaks as the power cuts. His body finally goes slack and he just tries to  _ breathe _ , the sound loud and ragged in his ears. He’s soaked with sweat from head to toe and he just…

He  **hurts.**

Joker comes up next to him, fingers carding through his hair. Jason doesn’t even have the energy to flinch, much as he wishes otherwise. He can’t feel his arms. Or his shoulders, hardly. The only thing that’s not...that’s not just  **pain** is his ankle, because that’s a special sort of hurt. Jagged, kinda. There’s no winning, either; either he sacrifices his shoulders and hip to try and keep his weight off the ankle, or he sacrifices the ankle to try and steady himself.

“There, now,” Joker says, voice faux-gentle. “Poor, forgotten little Robin.”

_ Get off me. _

“Don’t you worry, pumpkin, Uncle Joker’s going to garner you some well-wishes! Well, hopefully.  _ Mayyyyyyybe. _ ”

**_Get away from me._ **

He finally manages to muster the strength to pull his head away from those fingers, but whereas yesterday that got him a laugh and applause for ‘keeping that fighting spirit!’, today it makes the clown  **angry** .

Joker grabs his hair and yanks his head back, throwing his weight against him to force him down onto his broken ankle.

“You listen to me, you sorry little brat,” he hisses, spit striking Jason’s cheek. “If you’re going to be ungrateful, I’ll give you something to be ungrateful  **for.** ”

It takes him a second to realize that the terrified whimpering sound is coming from him. Joker laughs and kisses his temple before finally backing off.

“Sleep tight, Robin! We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

* * *

_ I wish I was dead. _

Jason wakes up with his body aching and itchy, half-dried tear tracks on his face. He thinks he might have been having a nice dream, but he can’t be sure. It doesn’t matter now. It’s over, and he’s awake for another day.

He’s still on the hook. He’s also been gagged. The first time this happened, he panicked. Now? It...it doesn’t matter, either. He’s hurting and beyond frightened and he doesn’t understand why he’s still alive.

“Hellooooo, Gotham!” Huh? “I’ve been thinking about a little problem we have plaguing our fair city!” What’s goin’ on? “Elections are coming up, and it’s come to my attention that we’re just not getting much turnout!”

Jason pulls his eyes open (oof, they feel swollen) and for a moment, thinks he’s either still asleep or hallucinating. Joker has a camera, just a little handheld thing, and he’s...dressed like Uncle Sam. Seriously, he must’ve gotten the costume at Spirit or something; he’s got the pants, the jacket, and a sequin-y hat. It’s awful.

“Now, as a patriotic citizen, I said to myself, ‘Joker, old boy, this just isn’t right! Why, it’s just disgraceful! You’ve got to motivate these ingrates to overlook the corruption and vote for once in their lives! You’ve got to  **fire them up** .’” Jason would like to know why he’s doing this down  **here** . He never comes down here unless it’s to inflict physical and/or mental pain. “So let’s try something a little more personal, hmm? A little closer to home.” This is starting to sound bad. “Now!” He comes over to Jason and leans in close so they’re both in frame. “May I present the Boy Wonder! Yes, folks, this is Gotham’s own very own Robin! Or, well, he  **was** yours, and now he’s aaall  **mine** .” He can’t breathe. He wants to breathe, but all he can manage are frantic little  _ hics _ . “But you get to have some say in what I do with him! Now, I’ve made a poll for this occasion.” A little card appears in front of Jason’s eyes. “See this website? You go here. It’s simple! Just tell me whether you want the little bird to  **live** , or if you want me to wring his neck and post it on the internet!”

What?

Joker cackles.

“Yes, indeedy, his life is in your hands, and if that won’t get you out and voting, then nothing will! Now remember, kids--” He straightens up, adopts a serious expression. “--only  **you** can prevent wildfires!”

Stupidly, Jason thinks it’s over. But then liquid sloshes onto his cape. It takes him a second to register the smell of gasoline, but when it hits, he starts struggling. There’s the  **flitch!** of a match being struck and--

\--and it’s on fire. It goes up fast, heat blistering against his back and while his armor keeps it from burning his skin, it doesn’t go up high enough to protect his head and neck. Flames lap at the base of his skull and he thrashes, ankle be damned, to try and get  **away** .

**NONONONONONONONONONONONO--**

He takes it back he doesn’t want to die not like this not down here somebody  **please--**

Joker laughs, says something to the camera, and then he turns. He’s holding a crowbar. Jason screams behind his gag, but that does fuck-all to save him from taking one good  **slam!** to the forehead.

He’s out before he knows it.

THE END 


	15. Into the Unknown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Science gone wrong. Takes place in...eh, screw it. Takes place in the ‘Angels on the Sidelines’ timeline-thing. Up later because of (gasp) Mr. DICK Lucas, who FINALLY graced us with a stool sample for the vet at a time that the vet was open, which meant that the time I usually spend tweaking as needed was spent driving across town. What a morning. Pity me.

To be fair, nobody could have predicted the sheer what-the-fuckery of this particular scientist.

Then again, it’s Gotham and they have Weird Shit here.

That said, because this Gotham, none of this is in any way their fault...but they need to collect the boss and get out of here before Batman comes to investigate the explosion. He’d given chase to one of the scientists, leaving them to get the animals and people-people!-out, and, well, the west wing had gone up.

This is a mess.

Frank and Riley are corralling the people, Jimmy’s offline-the explosion probably messed with their communications-and Mark’s muttering darkly about, “Ten to one he touched a big, red, button...on God, one of these days,  _ one _ of these days…”

Yeah, Mark’s probably not wrong.

The west wing isn’t that mangled. There’s a small fire on one side, and a few of the support pillars are damaged, but it’s mostly fine. The scientist is unconscious but unharmed, and the boss is--

“Up here.”

What--holy  **shit** .

He’s, uh. Little. Like. Younger. What is he, fifteen, sixteen? Shorter, scrawnier, no brand on his face. He’s a  **kid** , all baby-faced and drowning in his clothes.

“What the fuck,” Mark says. Trent mutters something in what Antoine’s pretty sure is Russian. The boss rolls his eyes and leans forward. He’s up in an alcove, seemingly stuck.

“My grappler’s down there,” he grumbles, pointing at a smashed table. “So will one of you get me down?”

“Hang on--” Trent starts, but Mark holds up a hand.

“Nah-uh. You’re like a cat; you hide shit from me. I’ve seen you hop off buildings with no grapple, so why not now.”

“Because I’m a little unsteady and unused to being a damn teenager again,” the boss snaps. “That’s why.”

“Bullshit. Try again.”

Silence. Antoine thinks he might try to get down on his own, but then he slumps forward and mumbles, “That fucker broke my ankle and it’s not healed right now.”

“There, was that so hard? What else.”

“Two cracked ribs. Concussion. Dislocated shoulder, but I popped it back in. Some abdominal bruising. M’fine, just a little stuck. Okay? Happy now?”

“Hm.” Jesus. “Trent, go get him. Carefully.”

Trent can climb, it’s just unsettling when he does it. Once he’s halfway up, Antoine turns to Mark and murmurs, “What now?”

“I don’t know...grab the scientist. Maybe she can fix him.”

Christ, this is not what he expected when he woke up today.

Look. It’s not like they don’t know. Okay, so they don’t know everything, but they have the gist. Part of the reason they don’t like Batman is, straight-up, because of the invasion thing. But the other part is that, well…

Yeah. The no-killing thing? Look what that got you. You let the crazy clown-man run around for long enough, and this happens. 

He heads over to the scientist, pulling out his radio as he goes to check in. Jimmy’s channel is nothing but static, so he’ll just have to be surprised, but the others...they need to know.

“We got him.”

“And?”

Yeah.

He buys himself some time by zip-tying the woman’s hands behind her back, but that can’t last forever.

“You know that thing we all know about but don’t talk about?”

“Which thing.” Frank doesn’t sound too happy. “There’s a few.”

True.

“The clown thing.”

“Okay.”

“Um.” There’s no way to make this not sound crazy. “Mad science happened and the boss is, um. He’s, like...fifteen? Ish? I don’t know, he’s little, that’s all I know.”

**“What.”**

“He’s fine, just. Yeah. Be prepared.”

“He know you?”

“Yeah, he knows what happened, he’s mentally fine, just...smaller. Um. Brand’s gone. Stuff like that.”

“Jesus. Okay. We’ll meet you back at base; cops are twenty minutes out and we don’t wanna leave these people alone.”

“Fine. Over and out.”

Okay. Scientist, check, um...that flash drive might be helpful. Okay, okay...oh, hey, Trent’s back down, the boss cradled against his chest like, well, like a kid. And Mark’s mad about something else.

“--fucking  **fever** !”

The boss grins, loose and a little hazy.

“So I’m a little sick. Not like I haven’t been through it before.”

“That’s beside the point! You gotta tell me this shit so I can work accordingly! So. I’m asking  _ nicely _ . Is there  _ anything _ else I should know.”

“Uh-uh. I’m just sick, I swear.”

Mark sighs.

“I’m gonna look you over when we get back. On God, if I find out you’re lying, Batman couldn’t protect you.”

Jason laughs, but that promptly turns into a nasty cough.

“Wouldn’t be the first time. M’okay. Promise.”

“Humph. We’ll see. You’d better be.”

“I lived, didn’t I?”

“Some days, I gotta wonder,” Mark says dryly. “We are going home. You are going to go to bed and stay in it.  _ Or else. _ ”

* * *

Mark half-wishes Batman would crash through the window so he could lay into him. But only half; the logical part of him says it’s not worth the fight. Not today.

“Ok _ aaaay _ ,” he says, once his disaster of a patient is settled in his own bed, “I want you off that ankle. That bandage on your wrist? Stays there. Touch any of your stitches and I will personally end you. Clear?”

“Clear.”

“Good.” He hates treating kids. And he knows the boss isn’t  **really** a kid, but he looks like one now and he was one when Joker did this to him. None of the stitches or bandages or bone resets will matter, more than likely, which is hard to swallow. “There anything  **else** I should know about?”

The silence is loaded. Too bad.

“No. No, that was...that wasn’t part of his curriculum.”

Well, that’s something.

“Good.” He checks the IV. “That also needs to stay there.”

“I know, I know.” He sighs and twists a bit. “M’fine, y’know. Just tired.”

“And knocked all to hell. So keep your ass in this bed unless the sheets are on fire. Got it?”

“Mm-hm.”

“I see you up and about, you’re back in here with a babysitter.”

“I  **know** .”

“Good. Just. Get some sleep, huh?”

“M’gonna. T’anks.”

“Sure.” Christ. This is not what he signed up for in  **any** capacity. “Anyone I should be calling?”

**“No.”** That has him sitting up and grumbling when Mark reaches over to shove him back down. “No Batman. Or anyone else.”

“Fine.” He inspects the water and stands up. “Stay. In. Bed. Or I  **will** call Batman.”

He won’t, really, and they both know it. But it’s the threat that counts, and it’s just…

They all know the general gist. Mark knows more, because he’s seen the scars, dealt with the lingering damage. But it’s very different, and  **very** unsettling, to be faced with the fresh injuries. He hates treating kids, and this...it takes a special sort of psychopath to inflict these sorts of wounds on a  **child** . And honestly, this whole thing is just…

Bruises fade. And right now, there’s a set of deep, dark finger-shaped ones just under his jaw. There’s a crowbar-shaped one (so clear it could be stenciled on) on his back. There’s track marks scattered across his arms and in a few places around his neck. Earlier, when Mark was looking him over in earnest-and demanding to know  **everything** that bastard had done, because Complications are very real-he’d admitted to being given questionable drugs at times, and to being fucking electrocuted.

The Joker had no right to die as quickly as he did. And next time their paths cross, Mark has  **words** for the Bat. Most of them with four letters.

“If you need anything, send a text.”

“M’kay.”

“And don’t you  **dare** try to bum cigarettes off of Antoine. No smoking until this is over.”

“Humph.”

He ducks out, not sure if he’s relieved to be done with that or not, and shuts the door behind him. Everyone else is gathered in the living room, and the scientist is, last he checked, handcuffed to the bathroom sink.

“Well?”

He doesn’t always like this bit, the coming out of surgery to face worried friends and family, sometimes with bad news. But today’s okay, at least.

“Nothing life-threatening. I’ve got him on an IV, he’s gonna sleep.”

“Good.”

This is fuckin’ weird, but if it’s one thing they are, it’s good at sticking to the goal. And today, that goal is getting the boss back to his mostly-adult self.

“What’re we doing, then?”

Antoine coughs, fiddles with his lighter-and if he suckers in and gives anything to the boss, his dismembered corpse is getting dropped down the sewers for that monster that lives there-and straightens up.

“Okay. I take it that Batman doesn’t need to know about this?”

“No. But dibbs on Frank in case the boss, like...freaks.”

It hasn’t happened often, only when he’s been badly hurt. But Mark wants his insurance. Frank’s good at getting him to shut up and calm down.

“Fine. Jimmy, I want you on Batwatch. Riley, you’re on standby with him; if Batman or one of his little helpers starts getting nosey, redirect. I don’t care how. Trent, you and I are going to relocate our scientist. Mark...keep your phone on.”

Oof. Trent hasn’t used what he refers to as his ‘special talents’ in...not since they signed up to take on the Batman. But Mark’s worked with him before, over in Russia. He’s cleaned up the mess.

“She wouldn’t share?”

“Nope. Keep us posted.”

They disperse. Mark makes himself comfy on the couch next to Frank, who’s working his way through a crossword book. They catch sight, a few minutes later, of Trent hauling a woman with a hood over her head out the door, but, well, that’s...not really his problem yet.

“Well?”

“Well what.”

“How is he?”

Yeah.

“He says this was early on. So. Ankle’s only been broken once.” That really didn’t help. Neither did the ridiculously casual tone the boss had said that in. Ankles aren’t supposed to be broken any times. They don’t  **like** it. “He’s okay. For the moment.”

“You sound glum.”

“I think it’s gonna get worse before it gets better.”

* * *

Mark likes to be right. But sometimes, he wishes he wasn’t  **always** right.

Like now. It’s been about an hour since Antoine and Trent took off, and as of half an hour ago, the boss was dead asleep. His breathing had been a little wheezy, but he’d been  **still** and  **out** and when Frank had tucked the blankets back around him, he hadn’t even twitched.

But that was half an hour ago. Now, Mark’s been startled out of a sound Instagram Scroll by bloodcurdling screams.

“Shit--”

“What the hell--”

“I don’t know--”

“What’s--”

“Stay back!” he barks. He does not need three untrained dummies in his damn way. Maybe this is wearing off. Maybe it’ll wear off in stages or something. “Stay back, lemme just--”

The screams stop just as he gets the door open. Okay. Okay. No brand, that’s...he’s not sure about that, to be honest. The blankets are still in place, and nothing’s knocked over. The boss is still flat on his back, right where they left him, gasping for breath.

“Hey.” Stitches first. “You okay?”

“I--” He chokes on air and starts coughing, doesn’t stop even when Mark crosses the room to tug him upright.  _ “Shit--” _

“Shh.” There. “Just--”

“Take a drink,” Frank says from right behind him. “C’mon, easy in…”

He drains the glass and melts back against his pillow, panting.

“Ow.”

The stitches have held (and okay, he’s a little smug about that). Honestly, he’s fine. Well. For the current definition of ‘fine’.

“You good?” Frank’s saying now. “You need anything?”

“Uh-uh.” He sounds worse than he did before. Mark turns around to kick the other two back where they belong. “Jus’. Just a dream. Just a dream, s’all.”

He sounds like he’s trying to reassure himself more than anything.  **This** is why he called dibbs on Frank.

“Yup,” Frank says. “But you’re good, right?”

“Where is everyone?”

“Jimmy and Riley are on Batwatch, and Antoine and Trent are...chatting with the scientist.”

“Can someone get me audio--”

Oh no. None of that.

“Cold day in hell, sir,” he says, resisting the urge to snap his gum as punctuation. “You’re down and out, which means no work for you.”

“Oh, come on--”

**“No.”** He turns around and crosses his arms. “You can sleep, read, or stare at the ceiling, but let the rest of us do the work, okay?”

“I can at least--”

“N. O.”

“You wanna come out and watch TV or something?” No. No, he doesn’t, Frank, don’t help. Stop helping right now. “Little change of scenery?”

Jason, the contrary bastard, shrugs.

“Sure.”

WOW.

“Aight. Lemme just get the couch set up a little, okay? Throw a sheet on it so Mark doesn’t freak?”

He’s been betrayed. Frank was supposed to keep him in bed,  **resting.**

He wants Trent next time. Trent won’t fall prey to sad eyes.

“Sure.”

He follows Frank back out, waits until they’re by the linen closet, and hisses, “What are you doing?”

“He’s gonna sleep.”

“No he’s not! He’s gonna weasel his way into Jimmy’s office next, I see it coming--”

“Mark.” Frank turns, grips his arms. “Dude. Breathe. He’s gonna sleep, I...I bet you dish duty.”

Seriously.

“You bet me dish duty.”

“Yup.” Frank looks unnervingly smug. “I’m tellin’ ya, he’s gonna last ten, fifteen minutes on the outside. He’s just freaked out, that’s all.”

“Fine.”

They shake on it and Mark returns to unhook the IV. Or, as it turns out, lecture Jason for doing it himself until Frank comes and carries him out.

“This is a new Hell.”

“You’re fine.”

“I can walk on my own.”

“Don’t even think about it.”

“I can and have dragged myself twenty feet,” he grumbles. “Pretty quick, too.”

“Mm-hm.”

“I have!”

“Don’t try it today. Just sit here and watch TV.”

He huffs and curls into his oversized blanket. He really is a mess; shivery and hollow-looking. But...but the worst of it is-and Mark is gonna keep this to himself-is that this? This is early. There’s injuries he knows about that just aren’t  **here** yet.

Now that he’s out of his room, he’s starting to relax a little more. There’s no sass, no arguments, just a comfortable silence. And when Mark looks over half an hour or so later, he resigns himself to a month of horrors; he’s asleep, slumped against Frank’s shoulder and snoring softly.

“Told you so.”

He’s sleeping. That was the goal.

“Yup.” Frank grins at him. Mark flips him the bird, on principle. “You did.”

Frank, the asshole, chuckles and settles back, crossword in hand. Mark scowls, checks his phone. Nothing. That’s either very good or very bad, no in-between.

Man,  **fuck** this city.

* * *

Jason stays asleep, even when Frank finally eases him off so he can see what’s going on in the computer room. It’s not a particularly  _ restful _ sleep-he’s twitchy and a couple times he asks for people Mark has never met or even heard of-but he stays out. He’s quiet and still when Trent calls, and Mark steps into the other room just in case.

“What’s bleeding.”

“Nothing. She’s got a bit of bruising from bouncing around in the trunk, but I didn’t even have to touch her.”

“You’re kidding.”

Trent laughs. Well. Sort of.

“Marky, buddy, I’m tellin’ ya, it’s ninety percent mental. Scare ‘em enough and they’ll sell out their own grandmas. She says it’ll probably wear off, but if he’s still like this tomorrow, she’ll look into it.”

Oh, good. An end in sight.

“And there’s no weird-ass side effects I should know about?”

“Nope. It’ll wear off in stages, she says, so. Uh, be aware of that.”

Great.

“The fuck was she trying to do, anyway?”

“Blink him out of existence.” Is that so. “It wasn’t strong enough, is all.”

What is  **with** Gotham? A lot of smart people live here. All of them appear to be into doing very bad things. Why? Is it so wrong to just...cure cancer? Or something?

He blames Batman. It’s easiest to blame Batman.

“You on your way?”

“Yup. See ya soon.”

He hangs up. Good. This isn’t supposed to be permanent, they just have to tough it out. It can’t be that long; the boss he may be, but on a technical level, he’s also the baby of the family.

“S’goin’ on?”

WHEN--

“What are you doing up?”

“Had to pee, ankle felt better.”

When Mark turns around, he supposes that’s fair enough. Jason’s a little bigger-very little, admittedly, but still-but he looks worse. Thinner. More cuts, more bruises. There’s an open slash across his nose that will scar, but no brand yet.

“Back to bed you go,” he says tiredly. “This shit’s supposed to wear off. Looks like that’s true.”

Jason just slumps against the doorframe, arms curled around his ribs. Mark rubs his nose and goes over to get him.

“I don’t feel good.”

That’s  **bad** . Mark’s fought him over going out after literally having to get a rib back under the skin.

“How so?”

“Everything hurts. Kinda. Kinda dizzy.”

“Come on. Let’s take a look.”

New injuries, more that he recognizes. No more fever, no new stitches needed, but he’s not...totally with it.

“You think you’re drugged?”

“Could be.” He swallows. “I really don’t feel good.”

“Stay in bed. I want you to try and eat something.” Jason makes a face. “Too bad. I don’t care what it is, toast crackers, tortilla chips, literally anything. You gotta.”

“Baked potato?”

Fine.

“Sure. Give me a few minutes, just...just stay in bed.”

Riley’s in the kitchen. He can’t reach shit, which means he’s on the counter, which means Mark scares the shit out of him when he yanks open the drawer with the vegetable brush in it.

“He’s awake,” he explains. “I think it’s moving along, he’s...older.”

Riley gives him a thumbs-up before punching him in the shoulder. Jerk. Whatever, whatever.

“--back in the bathroom, I guess, I’ll...you hungry? Nod or shake--o-kay, then, guess not.” Heavy footsteps-Trent with a passenger-go off somewhere and Antoine appears in the kitchen. He looks...worn out. “Hey.”

“She wasn’t lying,” Mark says, stabbing the potato with more force than it probably deserves. What can he say, stabbing potatoes is an acceptable outlet for stress and upset. “It’s wearing off, or...or whatever.”

“Good.”

“How’d it go?”

“Easy enough. Drove around alot, to ramp up the tension and all. Dropped by a Home Depot-we can fix that faucet now, by the way-drove some more. Any fun new updates?”

“I think he’s drugged, but I don’t know for sure, so.” He shoves the potato in the microwave. “Food.”

“Good.” He pulls down a glass, which Riley promptly robs, and reaches up for a new one. “No Bat problems?” Riley shakes his head. Antoine gets himself an orange juice. “We’re good, then? Nothing awful’s going on?”

“I’m fine.” That little-- “I’ve had worse.”

“What are you--why--no.  **No.** ” No respect. ‘You’re the doctor!’ they say. ‘You went to medical school!’ they say. But do they listen? NO! ‘I’m fine!’ they say, like they sat through hours and hours of lectures at ass o’ clock in the morning, hearing all the stories about dumbasses who said those very words and then died of, like, sepsis. But did they? No. No, they didn’t, which means that they should listen to him at all times. “Turn around. Get back in bed, I don’t care how. And if I catch you up again, just one more time--”

Jason completely ignores him, shuffles slowly to the pantry and rummages through it until he comes up with an apple cider packet. Mark politely doesn’t mention the lack of nutritional value in the packet. See? He can make concessions...just not ones that allow his  _ mad-science-d, de-aged patient to frolic around like he’s not nursing injuries from  _ **_being fucking tortured._ **

“Why are you up.”

“Thought it might clear my head.” Riley slides a mug over. “Thanks.”

“You look like shit, boss,” Antoine says. “Maybe Mark’s got a point.”

“I do. Take that back to bed and stay in it.”

The microwave dings. Jason hops up on the counter and Mark has visions of grinding bones, strained tendons, and who-knows-what-else.

“Potato first.”

Mark tries counting to ten. That does jack shit.

* * *

It could be worse. It could be so much worse. The beginning was the worst of it, apparently, because by the next afternoon, he’s...almost back to normal. A year or two off.

And then Batman crashes through the window in a shower of glass.

They’re lucky,  **damn** lucky, that Trent happened to be chilling on the couch right by the window; the Bat makes it three steps before he’s grabbed, which gives them the time they need to grab guns.

Rule number four: don’t look away from Batman.

**“Where is he.”**

“What are you doing here.”

**“Where is the Red Hood.”**

“Get the belt,” Antoine tells Riley. “Jimmy, we gotta do something with the camera--”

“I know--”

“The hell’s going on out here?” Jason-adult, moron,  _ self-preservation is for other people _ Jason-meanders in, rubbing his arms and looking very annoyed. “It’s the middle of the day! You never come out in the sun, you burn!” Batman aims a nasty kick that only misses Riley because Trent moves. Jason sighs. “Drop him.”

“You okay, sir?”

“Fine. Just. Just a little tired.” They’ll be confirming this later, when Batman is gone. “What do you want?”

“A scientist is missing after an explosion you were involved in.”

“We had to talk. You can have her.”

Mark knows they’ll see him again. But they’re all here, and the boss really is fine, which means that Batman has to take Dr. Levias and go. Once they’re sure he’s gone, Trent gets to work tarping off the window-AGAIN-and Mark drags Jason into his room.

“Good?”

“All good.”

“No weird shit? No third eye growing out of your ass?”

“No?”

“Lemme just give you a once over. Siddown.”

“But--”

**“Now.”**

He’s fine. Same as he was before the explosion. And they’re not going to talk about any of it, because that is way too much.

Yeah. What the actual  **fuck** , Gotham.

THE END


	16. A Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hallucinations.

The waiting. S-s’always. S’always the worst part. Knowing the respite from new pain isn’t gonna last but not knowing when  **he’ll** come back. Could be. Could be hours, minutes. Days, sometimes. Once, a whole week. Long enough for his nerves to forget what it was like to be sanded down.

Long enough for his throat to heal enough to scream.

He can’t get up, now, even though he’s not tied down. It doesn’t matter; he can’t get up, can’t even lift his head.

He’s pulled onto his back, forced to look at the single, swaying bulb on the ceiling, and then dragged…somewhere. What’s happening? Is Joker…s’Joker bored of him? He doesn’t wanna die, not here, not like this, not with that damn grin burned into his eyelids.

But maybe death’s not so bad, f’it means he’ll stop hurting.

“Please…”

His cape’s stripped off, along with his gloves and belt, and he wonders. Wonders if he’s going to be a different sorta toy now.

It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore.

His eyes slide shut, hot tears clinging to his lashes, and when cold fingers tilt his head sideways, he passes out.

* * *

Consciousness hits him like a truck. He’s still  **there** , staring at that goddamn bulb, but he’s not alone.

It takes him about five seconds to register that, and it takes him twenty more to register that it’s Dove Marquis, of all people.

“Listen to me, sweetheart,” she’s saying softly. “It’s not real, okay? Whatever you’re seeing, it’s not real.”

Oh.

He closes his eyes and repeats, “Not real.”

“Good boy--”

“You’re not real.”

“No, no, honey, I--” But she just said… “I’m right here, hon. See?” She reaches over and grips his hand. “Hallucinations can’t touch you, right?”

No. No, th-they can’t. But…but she’s never here, why’s she here, she’s not s’posed ta--

“You’re here.” Her fingers are warm, warmer than he is by far. Maybe…maybe she’s looking for something else, maybe Penguin sent her to ask the Joker something, he does that sometimes--

“Yeah, kiddo. I’m right here, you’re--”

“Don’t go.” He pulls himself up and hugs her. She’s always been nice to him, she won’t…not here, not like this… “Please don’t leave me here--”

“Sh-sh-sh--”

“He’s gonna kill me.” He swallows and feels her hug him back. “He’s gonna kill me, please, please help me--”

“Shh.” But-- “Sweetheart, do you know where you are?”

He nods. He can do this. He’s still. Still with it, he’s worth saving, honest.

“Arkham. S-some abandoned room--”

“No.” Huh? “No, honey, you’re in my apartment.” But… “I found you on my porch, you had a run-in with Crane.”

No. No, no, he didn’t, he’s…he’s…

Some little voice in the back of his head whispers,  **She’s never been here before.**

She’s rocking him a little now, one hand pressed against the back of his skull.

“You’re not there, sweetheart, you’re safe, he can’t hurt you anymore.”

Yes he can. He can come in any time he wants, Jason’ll never get away from him, he knows that--

“He s-said--”

“Shh, baby.” More rocking, and her other hand moves gently up and down his back. “He’s not here. You’re safe, I promise.”

Everything seems to flicker, and for a second or two it’s not Arkham, it’s a blue room and he can hear traffic outside. Maybe…maybe it’s true.

“You promise?”

“I promise.” Arkham’s walls come back and he squeezes his eyes shut, presses his head to her shoulder. “You’re safe, sweetheart, it’s over.”

He wants that to be true. God, he wants…he wants…

“Okay.” He swallows. “Okay.”

“I gotcha, kid. I gotcha. Try to breathe, huh? He can’t hurt you, he’s not here.”

He can hear him, a few floors up. But she’s kinda right, anyway; he’s not  **right** here, and…and maybe…

He’s tired. He’s just so goddamn tired.

At some point, she lowers him onto what feels like a mattress and tucks a blanket around him. Then she’s gone and he’s just about to panic when a warm washcloth moves over his face and scrubs through his hair. Oh.

“Just close your eyes, try to sleep, okay?” He nods, watches the bulb swing back and forth. “You’re okay, baby. You’re okay.”

No. No, he’s not.

The area around the bulb starts shrinking every time he blinks and eventually he stops blinking at all.

* * *

He has a hazy, dreamlike idea that he’s shooed into a hot shower and given clothes that aren’t his. The idea proves to be fact when he comes to on a couch.

“Hey, kiddo.” Huh? “You awake?”

Sweatpants. And a t-shirt.

“Wha…”

“ _ There _ you are.” But… “Think you can keep some water down?”

His throat hurts. Experience says it’s from screaming, but why was he screaming--oh.

That’s right. Crane. Hadn’t been on. On purpose. Supposed to be one of Falcone’s shipments but wasn’t. Crane, predictably, had not been happy. Jason can still taste the gas on his tongue, thick and heavy like mucus,

**_“This’ll teach you to interfere, you little brat!”_ **

and it feels like Richardson might’ve actually hit him with that pipe; his knee doesn’t feel like it’s going to hold his weight for long.

Nasty batch this time. Even now, with the mostly-sure knowledge of what happened, he can still hear the hum of the camera and the faint sounds of everyday Arkham life a few stories up.

And that damned laughter.

“Hood.”

Right. Dove. Water.

“Maybe?”

There’s a sudden cold patch on his head and he’s left to wonder why. Not for long; he blinks and there’s a straw near his lips.

“Couple’a sips, this batch’s a puker…there.”

The water’s cold and he envisions it sizzling when it hits his throat. Helps, though, loosens his tongue a little.

“Happened?”

“Short version?” He nods, the blur in his vision conjuring tiles. “I found you on my porch about two o’ clock this morning. About four hours in, you were with it enough to shower without drowning, and now it’s a little after noon.”

That explains the memories of hot water.

“Thanks.” Speaking hurts. “I’m gonna get up--”

“Nah-uh.” But… “Kiddo, you about took out my houseplant before I could get you to calm down.” Oops. “Go back to sleep, you’re no trouble.”

Mm-mm, he’s gotta get up, get home, get…get…

Five minutes. Five more minutes. His knee needs the time anyway.

Five…more…minutes…

* * *

Consciousness bleeds back slowly, bringing with it the prickly sensation of fever, a very persistent sense of paranoia, and aches that he can’t be sure are phantom or not.

The light bulb is still swinging from the ceiling, but the sounds of Arkham are muted. And he may  **feel** achy and miserable, but he’s on something soft and someone’s petting his head. His first thought is that it’s Mom, but Mom can’t do that anymore--

“--d? You back with me a little bit, honey?”

“M-Miss Marquis?”

She comes into focus, little blurry around the edges, and he blinks a few times to fix that.

“There you are, kid.” Okay. Still okay. “How’re you feeling?”

“Sleepy.” Ow. “Throat hurts.”

“I bet. It’s been a long night.” Time s’it now? “Think you can keep some water down?”

His stomach threatens rebellion if he tries and he shakes his head, regrets it a second later when the room swirls.

“Mm-mm.”

“Okay. Go back to sleep, huh? He’s not here, I promise.”

“’Kay.” It feels like someone else is here. He doesn’t know why, but it feels like…like someone’s… “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, sweetheart. Go to sleep.”

He closes his eyes and pulls what feels like an electric blanket up to his chin. Dove’s hand moves in his hair again and he clings to that, clings to  **Crane’s shit can’t touch you you’re okay you’re okay.**

He dozes, anyway, but before that can become anything else there’s a familiar scream of laughter and Joker slams a crowbar into his ribs shrieking,  **WAKE UP WAKE UP TODDERS IT’S TIME TO PLAY!**

**Please please stop no more--**

It’s no use. He  **knows** the clown’s not here, but he can still hear him behind the couch and his ribs hurt almost as bad as they did when they’d been broken initially.

He rolls over, intending to try and find a new position, and--

**NO PLEASE NO--**

He’s there, he’s  **there** , with that same goddamn grin, and-

“Hood.  **Hood.** ” But-- “S’just the commish, honey, he’s not gonna hurt you.”

Huh?

Joker wavers, purple starting to wash out, and maybe…maybe…

“You  **promise** \--”

“I promise.” Okay. Okay. “Go back down, huh?”

She hasn’t lied to him yet. And the. The purple, it’s almost gone. ‘N Joker has a mustache now.

Okay.

He goes back a little faster than his head would like and waits. The Joker continues to flicker and fade and eventually the familiar, raspy (grandfatherly?) voice says, “Hey, Hood.”

Jim Gordon. S’okay. S’gonna be okay.

“Hey, Commish.”

Now, granted, everything is blurry and tilting, but from where he is, Gordon hasn’t changed too much. A bit grayer around the temples (Barbara, probably), but he’s still the quiet, somber man with pity for the robber tryin’ ta get cash for his wife’s surgery and Jolly Ranchers in his coat pockets for scared kids and tired Robins.

(And Jason remembers, once, lifetimes ago, runnin’ into him shortly after Mom died and figurin’ this was it, but all he’d gotten was a warning and ten bucks for McDonald’s. Does Gordon remember that at all?)

“How’re you feeling?”

“Crane’s an asshole.” The blanket’s warm at his stomach, but it feels like it’s cooling down. S’it turned off?

“True.” He pulls the blanket up, fumbles for the remote. Yeah, red light’s gone. “Don’t suppose you know where he went?”

“He wasn’t s’posed ta be there.” He knows that. His head’s fuzzy, but he knows that. (Remembers the second of lucidity, of  **OH SHIT** before everything had fallen down around him and he’d run, trying desperately to  **get away from Him** before collapsing and watching the crowbar scuff against the tiles as the clown came at him.) “Fucker gave me faulty intel.” He swallows, hopes Gordon’ll be sympathetic like he’s always been. “Sorry. For before.”

“It’s all right, son.”

And doesn’t that hurt like a kick to the throat? He has no response for that, except to curl into a ball and kinda hope Gordon leaves. Dove ruffles his hair and murmurs, “I’ll be right back, okay, kiddo? Five minutes. Do you need anything?”

**Don’t leave me here,** **_please_ ** **.**

“Mm-mm.”

“Try to go back to sleep, huh?”

Maybe.

“’Kay.”

“Good boy…five minutes, I promise.”

They both leave and Jason closes his eyes to try and do what she said, but that only makes the laughter louder and he ends up looking at the window, watching the rain fall. He’s tired, he really is, it’s just…

“Oh, sweetheart.” Huh? “You gotta be exhausted, kid.”

“Sorry. I tried, I did, I just…”

“Shh. S’okay, I know this shit’s not fun.”

His skin hurts. Crane’s gonna pay for this, when he can sit up without feeling dizzy.

“M’tired,” he whispers, because he  **is** tired, he’d kill for an hour’s worth of no dreams. “But he won’t shut up.”

“Want the TV on?”

“M’okay. Sorry.”

“Shh.” There’s the sound of a finger tapping a screen and then, “Since you can’t sleep, wanna find out how you die in  _ Harry Potter _ ?”

“’Kay.”

And he means to, honest he does. But Joker’s finally starting to shut the hell up and…and…

He’s just tired and it’s safe here.

Dove stops talking and a second later she straightens the blankets out and murmurs, “Sweet dreams, kiddo.”

**Thanks.**

Then there’s nothing.

THE END


	17. Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate prompt: water. Obviously. For what it’s worth, my parents let me watch Psycho at age nine-ish (so I could appreciate the twist without having been spoiled by pop culture). IT WAS SO WORTH IT.

When Jason was about eight, Mom let him stay up late because  _ Poltergeist _ was gonna be on. She’d had one of her better days, and Willis was...who fucking cares where Willis was, and they’d made a whole thing out of it. Made a little blanket fort on the couch and nattered on down to the 99 Cents store ‘cause they were doing a two-candies-for-a-buck special. She’d gotten Butterfingers. Jason had gotten sour gummy worms.

He hadn’t thought it was really that scary. Good, yeah, but scary? Pfft. Mom had, though. ‘Specially early on, after Carol Anne got sucked into the closet.

And then had come the pool sequence.

Jason had never been taught how to swim-never any reason to learn-but he’d always...drowning had seemed like such an awful way to go. Being mobbed by skeletons didn’t make it any better. It had thoroughly freaked him out...but not enough to chicken out and not finish the movie.

Fast-forward twelve years, and Jason’s thinking his eight year-old was no dummy.

He’d chased...something...into a condemned gym. There’s a lot of condemned buildings in Gotham. They tend to make good explosive fodder. Anyways, the something-human, has to be-had seen him and  **sprinted** away, and running from is almost never a good look. Not down here. Uptown? Fair. Crime Alley? They don’t...they don’t usually run. They may not get too close, but they don’t run from him.

(He doesn’t want them to. The scum of the earth should be afraid of him. That single mom working late should not.)

So of course he’d given chase, tracked them through dark, moldy hallways and into the pool room. There’s nowhere else they could have gone, he’d been right on their heels and the damn door had been still swinging. But the room was empty.

Or.

It looked empty. Right up until something heavy and hard hit the back of his head and sent him toppling into the pool. The pool that had water in it.

Jason had had just enough time to wonder about the weirdness of that before he’d tried to get his bearings and, well, not drown, and...bumped into a body. A body chained to the floor of the pool.

There’s a lot of bodies in here.

He can swim just fine these days, thanks to Bruce, and he’s about to launch himself back out of the water when there’s a gunshot and he stills. Where is the sorry bastard…

“That was easy.”

“Who the hell are you.”

It’s dark. That is a problem. And echoey, which isn’t helping,  **and** his head hurts. Not badly, because he wears a helmet, but still--

**BANG!**

White-hot agony rips through his left shoulder, sending him reeling backwards in the water and into...somebody. The corpse shudders and he feels something tear free, but more importantly, he’s bleeding and he can’t make his arm do as it’s told.

It’s okay. It’s okay. He’s got three working limbs, he’s not gonna drown.

**What the hell is going on?**

“Your blood,” the voice-a man’s, Jason thinks-continues, “will nourish the others, and they will awaken as my ever-loyal children.”

“Buddy, you’re  **sick** ,” Jason spits, clinging to the anger. Anger is warm. Anger is consciousness. Anger is  **life** . Something gently nudges him. An arm. Well, that’s what tore off his friend here, apparently. “Sick and twisted and  **dead** . If you think--”

**“SHUT UP!”**

The sudden scream startles him into doing exactly that. This hurts. He’s been shot before, but it really, really hurts and he’s honestly not sure how much longer he can tough this out.

“You’re going to die there,” the voice says, hoarse but soft again. “I’m going to watch you. Just to make sure. You have a habit of getting back up.”

That he does. And he’ll do it again.

“Screw you,” he snarls, and then sucks in a gasp and dives under.

He can’t see, and his shoulder’s on fire, but he dashes forward just in time to dodge another bullet. He smacks into things he  **knows** are dead, but he can’t afford to think about them. Not now. He’s not joining them.

Outstretched fingers bump the hard, sharp wall of the pool and he stops, lurches up for air. Water’s starting to creep into his helmet, but it’s just at his chin, he’s okay there.

The hard thing smashes into his face and knocks him back, and  **then** it comes down on top of his head. See, this is why he  **has** a helmet. Imagine the damage this could be doing.

He floats, wheezing and in pain, and tries to get a  **glimpse** of his attacker. Nothing. Not even a shadow.

“You’re crazy.”

“No. Just enlightened.”

“Nothing is going to happen. Do you understand that? All these people have died for nothing.”

“Not nothing. And take heart, Hood, your death won’t be in vain, either.”

It’s getting harder to keep his head above water. He gulps for air and tries inching towards what he thinks is the shallow end.

He doesn’t get far; something tangles around his ankle and  **tugs** , and he goes under with a strangled cry. He scrabbles around to try and figure out what it is-rope?-but it won’t  **come loose** and he can’t--

He doesn’t want to die like this.

Knife. He keeps knives on him for this exact reason.

He fumbles for one, breath loud and ragged in his ears and his entire left arm weak and uncooperative. Come on, come on…

The knife slips out of his fingers. He catches a glimpse of it as it drifts to the bottom, but before he can get another one out-or panic-a decaying face, caught in a permanent scream, comes up out of the darkness.

He jerks back. Rotting hands latch onto him and  **pull** , oblivious to his weakening struggles. The thing around his ankle breaks and he’s towed through the water.

“Please…”

There’s screaming. Frightened, incomprehensible gibberish, followed by a splash. He’s shoved at, half-helped and half-heaved out of the pool and onto the walkway.

He can’t see anything. But there’s water in his helmet and he opens it up, tugs it off and tries to breathe. There’s a commotion in the water, but then he moves wrong, and blacks out.

* * *

Jason wakes up right where he remembers being. His shoulder’s wrapped up, shoddily, it’s true, but still, and the lights are on now.

God, there’s so many. Men, women, a kid or two. What the hell? How long was this...what in the world…?

A body in black floats on the other end. Well. A few pieces of one. An arm here, a leg nearby. Jason doesn’t see a head, but…

Frightened and thoroughly bewildered, he eases himself upright, trembling from being wet and from the blood loss. They couldn’t have...that’s impossible. He pulled himself out of there, he must have, but...he didn’t do that.

He places a call to the cops, to come clean this up, and leaves. He’s gotta deal with his shoulder, get cleaned up after being...being in there, with them.

The shower’s hotter than it should be, the stitches messier than he usually manages, and he can’t bring himself to shut off the lights when he stumbles into his bedroom.

He doesn’t sleep that night, either.

THE END


	18. Panic! At the Disco

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phobias.

Is the little red--oh, it’s green now,  _ why _ do they keep changing the blasted light--never mind. Never  _ mind. _

The time is twelve thirty-eight A.M. on Tuesday, October eleventh. The patient is Red Hood, formerly known as Robin, true identity unknown and, frankly, unnecessary. We are progressing onwards from three days’ worth of talk therapy and onto a...highly experimental...new therapy.

Kitty, if you would stop laughing, this is a serious tape--

What? No they are not--oh. So they are. Thank you ever so much, truly, what would I do without you.

...that’s true.

Where was I...ah. Yes. New therapy. The current formula is twelve-twenty-beta, and will be administered intravenously momentarily.

Initial discussion hinted at patient likely suffering coulophobia, though further observation and interaction suggests a deep-seated case of athazagoraphobia*. Today’s study will confirm or deny my suspicions.

…

If you would be so kind, Mr. Hood, to--well, well, will you now? Of  _ course _ you will. All you need to do is release yourself from the gurney.

…

I thought as much.

Twelve milligrams of twelve-twenty-beta being administered now. Pulse is elevated, patient is...generally displeased.

…

The time twelve forty-five A.M., patient is beginning to show effects. Pulse remains elevated, breathing has increased, patient is  _ finally _ silent. Prior treatments of patient have varied; last treatment was...six years ago, reaction time was...yes, about the same, though there was a bit more screaming at the time. Children are more prone, I suppose...ah. Here we are.

Just tweak that...oh, no, what now, why is it  _ beeping _ \--there. Blasted machines...used to be you pushed a button and it worked...never mind. Patient is showing signs of distress; he is attempting to rise from the gurney--Mister Walker, those restraints had better hold or you’ll be his replacement--and respiratory rate has risen.

…

Interesting...patient is fairly silent, he has ceased attempting to leave the gurney and now appears to be crying.

…

Ah,  _ there’s _ the screaming. Patient is...well, well, this  _ is  _ interesting...patient is crying for Batman. Note to self, audio from observation room is included in this file.

…

Kitty, introduce outside stimulus...thank you. Outside stimulus in the form of an employee dressed as Batman has been introduced. Patient does not appear to realize it is not the real Batman. Patient is attempting to free himself from the gurney, outside stimulus is not engaging.

…

Oh, no. No, no. Remove the outside stimulus--get out of there, you idiot, this one kills people and I’m not wasting help on you--there. Outside stimulus removed, patient is...yes,patient remains restrained. Crying has increased. Words are...no, no, my mistake, words are now...angry.

…

Patient is now still again, appears to be...requesting Batman’s return, also appears to be...apologizing for...unable to determine, listen to observation room audio at a later time.

Pulse is beginning to return to a normal rate. Time is one A.M., so...too short, much too short a duration. Consider simmering the mixture for longer, also consider increasing the flower extract to counteract--what is that noise?

Then deal with him, you absolute fools-- _ leave _ him, he’ll be a distraction--get moving! And  _ stop _ him, or dangling off a gargoyle will be the least unpleasant thing that happens to you.

…

I said,  **_get moving._ **

THE END

  
  


*Fear of clowns and fear of abandonment, respectively.


	19. Broken Hearts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of...ALL OF THE ABOVE. (Grief, mourning loved one, survivor’s guilt.)

When Jason was ten, he made the mistake of leaving his mother alone on a bad night. Catherine Todd had had a lot of bad nights over the last year, but it wasn’t until the last six months that she’d…

She’d given it up, when Jason was born. There’d been a couple of minor relapses, but...she’d been clean, for a long time. And then she’d gotten sick, real sick, sick enough that she’d sometimes spend hours just curled up on the bathroom floor, crying from the pain.

So for the last six months, when it had been real bad, she just...she’d send Jason off to do something else for a little while. Give him that sad, soft smile and tell him to run along. And he’d done it until the first time it hadn’t gone well, when he’d dragged her into the shower because that’s what the neighbors had said to do, and after that, he’d...he’d listened, s’all. Maybe poked his head in from time to time, like he’d gotten in the habit of doing before, when she just didn’t feel good all the time. He’d been good at going unnoticed.

But that night, he’d gone to bed. Idiot move. And when he’d woken up due to the storm, a few hours later, Mom had...Mom had been gone.

_ If I’d just...stupid stupid stupid...shouldn’t have left her alone, I knew it wasn’t--I knew I  _ **_shouldn’t_ ** _ have… _

Bruce would later tell him, after a run-in with Scarecrow, that it hadn’t been his fault. Jason knew better. He had one job: take care of Mom. But he’d failed it, failed  _ her _ , and…

He should have been better. God, he should have been better. He hadn’t grieved her, not really, not  _ right _ , until...oh, maybe a month after Bruce took him in? And then one night, it had just...it had all crashed down on him. He’d sobbed for hours, until his throat swelled up and his head ached and his mouth tasted like gummy salt. And then he promised he wouldn’t fuck up again.

But.

Sheila. Sheila had...he should have...he should have been more careful. He knows. And sure, she...she did that to him, but if he’d been better, smarter,  _ paid more attention _ , she wouldn’t have died.

Maybe if he’d been a better son, she wouldn’t have felt like that was her only option. If he’d just... _ damn it _ , he should have pressed, should have checked. He could have helped if she’d only asked, but he should have known she wouldn’t. He hasn’t asked for help in years.

Come to think of it, he hadn’t asked all that often since before Mom died. Asking never got him much.

And now there’s this. He’s a curse, is what he is, a walking curse. Willis, on his worst days, had screamed at him that he should have died and spared them all the expense, and sometimes...sometimes Jason thinks he might be right. Mom would’ve been able to afford a real doctor, maybe, without him. Maybe Willis would’ve sucked less and helped her. Sheila wouldn’t be dead, or at least not because he was too busy being stunned stupid to  **move** . Maybe she wouldn’t have been sucked back into that at all, without him being a clown magnet.

This is his fault, too. If he’d been better, faster, smarter--Joker’s still got fanboys, even after all this time, if he’d just  _ dealt with them _ \--

But he didn’t, and the Iceberg Lounge is a pile of rubble and ash and broken glass, and there’s so, so many people dead and--

He’d tried. Honest, he had. But somebody-and it could have been anybody, really, he’s not popular-had gotten the drop on him and then the floor had gone out from under them both when the building blew and--

He saw her. Just for a second. Right before one of the bombs took her head off. If he’d been quicker, closer, if he’d dealt with these literal fucking clowns--

_ M’sorry m’sorry Dove m’so’sorry-- _

He really is just a curse.

THE END


	20. Toto, I Have a Feeling We're Not in Kansas Anymore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Medieval. Plague Tale ‘verse, but for those who haven’t played, all you really need to know is that Amicia and Hugo (that game’s protagonists) are on the run from the Inquisition because Hugo is Special. There are rats. Sir Nicholas is all danger, all the time. Definitely check it out, it’s great.  
> I have plunked Jason and co. in this world before. That story is What’s Left of God’s Light (May Not Be Enough). Canon for them here is that Jason and Antoine are childhood friends (Antoine’s about two years older) and everybody else met in the army.

Amicia thinks that maybe this time, just maybe, they’ll be all right. They had a decent night’s sleep, they’re going to get into the town and see someone about getting out of France altogether, things are generally looking up at last. And the men that found them, they’re trained soldiers, they…

Well, she wouldn’t say they make her feel totally safe, that...that’s asking for a little too much, but she feels better. It’s not just her between Hugo and the...everything. There’s a buffer, a good one.

And they were-are-nice enough. They were willing to entertain Hugo while Amicia explained everything to their leader-commander-person, and she hasn’t heard him laugh like that in weeks. Their commander-Jason, his name is Jason-had been a little less than pleased, at first, muttering about bringing the Inquisition down on their heads, but he’d softened up soon enough.

“Passage out of France?” he’d said. “I can get you that, easy. Well. I can get you to someone who can get you that.”

“You’d help us? I-I can’t pay you--”

He’d grinned, then, sharp and dangerous.

“I’d be lying if I said we hadn’t picked off a few of Vitalis’s men now and again.”

She hadn’t asked him to elaborate. He’d let the matter go, and come morning, they’d started a trek through the forest.

“You won’t be able to just go through the main gate,” he’s saying now. “They’ve locked everything up tight to keep the Bite out. But there’s a passage that goes under Arkham manor, you can take that.”

“Then what? They’ll notice us, surely.”

“Don’t let them notice you. There’s a...it’s sort of a spikey-looking house at the end of the main road, it’s impossible to mistake. You go there, ring the bell, and ask for Oswald Cobblepot.”

Ohhh, the things she does for her little brother…

“And he’ll help us?”

“Yes. If he doesn’t see you, show him this.” He reaches up, fumbles with something around his neck, and finally unclasps a medallion with a fox snarling at Death* engraved on it. “He owes me.”

Amicia decides here and now that she doesn’t want to know anything else. Hugo decides differently.

“What does he owe you for?”

Jason just laughs and ruffles his hair.

“It’s a long story, kid.”

“I don’t mind.”

“S’got a lotta fighting, bit of, er, stabbing.”  _ Death _ , Amicia mentally translates. “Might give ya nightmares.”

“I’m brave!”

“I bet you are. But--be quiet.”

Oh no.

She hears something, too. Horses. Voices.

“--they came this way!”

“Find them, you fools.”

Oh no.

“Sir Nicholas,” she whispers, and Jason swears furiously under his breath before shoving her forward.

“Move.  _ Quietly. _ ”

“How did he find us?”

“How do they find anyone? Now shh.”

She drags Hugo forward as quickly as she dares, sling gripped loosely in her fingers. She knows she can’t hold Nicholas off, not with a sling (or anything else, probably), but she can take his men. Maybe. Hopefully.

The voices fade into the distance, and she’s thinking that maybe, just maybe, they’re going to be fine.  **Then** a man suddenly steps out of the bushes  **right** behind them.

“ _ There _ you are- **HURK!** ”

She’s never...even in all this horror, she’s never seen a man’s head go off like that. It doesn’t even drop and roll, it...it bounces, and the body falls, blood streaming from the stump at the top.

Unfortunately, the voices pick up again, and Nicholas sounds closer.

“You go that way. I’ll go this way.”

Jason doesn’t sheathe his sword. He just takes a deep breath.

“Follow the road until you reach the walls. Arkham Manor is on the north end of town. The passage is blocked by a wooden door, you can break it down.”

“What are you doing?”

“Go. Take the kid and run, do you hear me?”

“But--”

“I’ll hold him off, just run.”

“I can--”

**“Go!”**

She tugs Hugo into the tall grass not a moment too soon; Nicholas arrives in the clearing seconds later. He sees the body, and Jason, and when he speaks, there’s an undertone of cold rage.

“The De Runes.”

“The who?”

“You know who. Don’t toy with me, boy.”

“I’m not. You man attacked me, despite the fact that I was minding my own business. Didn’t even let me get two words out.”

The grass doesn’t stretch far enough, and Nicholas will see them if they try to make a break for it. They’ll stay put, maybe he’ll go away. They just...have to not breathe too loudly. Or move.

“Tell me where they are.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Nicholas draws his sword and Amicia pulls Hugo to her. He doesn’t need to see this, he’s seen enough.

“No?”

Jason lunges forward. The swords meet in the middle and--

\--and Jason’s not dead. Or disarmed. Neither is Nicholas, but…

Maybe this won’t end horribly.

“So I lied. But they’re not here.”  **CLANG!** “You won’t find them now.”

“Amicia--”

_ “Shh,” _ she hisses. “Be quiet.”

**“Where are they!”**

Jason laughs, contemptuous and brash, and does...she doesn’t see what, exactly, but now Nicholas’s sword is on the ground. He’s got him, they’ll--

Nicholas snarls and then he’s moving, kicking Jason’s legs out from under him. He hits the ground hard, sword bouncing out of his hand, and before he can get back up, Nicholas plants his foot on his chest and presses the tip of that sword against his throat.

“I’m not asking again,” he says. “You can tell me, and your death can be merciful. Or I can pull it out of you.”

“Go to Hell.”

They have to help--

They can’t help him.

“Amusing. But pointless.”

The answering grin is downright feral.

“They’re long gone. Cleared out yesterday. You’re  **late** .”

Silence. Amicia starts ushering Hugo backwards, slowly and carefully, terrified to even breathe. Nicholas tilts his head deliberately to the left.

“Late.”

“Take that mask off, might help you hear me. And I can see your gobsmacked- **ngh!** ”

She doesn’t scream because she can’t. But she wants to, even as Nicholas leans over the sword jutting out of Jason’s body.

“I am never...late.” He pats the sword and picks up his own. “Pray that you perish before nightfall.”

Jason doesn’t answer. He’s making a horrible gasping noise and no-no-no, this all her fault, if she hadn’t--

Nicholas turns back, muttering darkly, and she hears him call out, “We are leaving. They’re not here.”

Minutes pass. No one comes, and she’s just thinking maybe they’re gone when Hugo pulls free and darts out of the grass.

“Hugo-!”

“We have to help him!”

There’s no helping him.

She follows, though, thinking...she doesn’t know, she just…

Jason is very still, hands fisted at his sides. His frantic gasps make the sword wiggle, just a bit, and...should she pull it out? She wants to, but...

**“Please--”**

“I’m sorry--”

“What’re--” He gags, but nothing comes. “What’re you doing, y-y-you were s’posed ta--”

“There was nowhere to go--I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, Jason--”

“Don’t.” He gulps, gags again. “Go.  **Go.** ”

They should go. They should go. But...they’re not far, not really, from the little camp. Maybe...they should at least know.

“We’re getting you help,” she says firmly, and he shakes his head.

“No help.  **Go.** ”

“Amicia,” Hugo whines, “do something!” 

They’re not far. And he doesn’t...the rats will come, at night, he doesn’t deserve that, he tried to help them. This is her fault, she never should have…

“Come with me,” she says, resolve hardening. They’ll go back, and get help, and then they’ll try again. Alone, this time. It’s for the best.

They’re farther than she realized; the sun has definitely moved in the sky by the time they get back, but the sentry-Riley, his name is Riley-takes one look at her before dragging the doctor towards a cart and running for the horse.

Jason, Heaven knows how, is still alive when they make it back to him. He’s not awake, but he’s breathing, and when the doctor crouches down and shakes him, he opens his eyes.

“Wha-what--”

“Shit, that’s bad...okay. Okay. Be still for me, be real still.”

“Hurts--”

“I know. I’m gonna do the best I can, ‘kay? Frank, get those kids outta here, c’mon--Trent, I need you to hold him--”

“Come on,” a man-Frank, she remembers him, he’d been so kind to Hugo-ushers them away. “You don’t need to see any of this. Come on.”

“This is my fault, if I hadn’t--”

“No, no, honey.” Somebody else-Antoine, maybe? She can’t really see-takes Hugo and then Frank’s enveloped her in a hug. Father used to hug her like this, but he’ll never hug her again and she’s gotten a man killed because she couldn’t just take care of herself and-- “Shh. Shh. He made his choice. I promise this isn’t your fault.”

She’s started sobbing, she realizes, but she can’t stop. Frank rocks her back and forth, making soothing noises, and she just…

She wants to go  _ home _ .

“I’m sorry,” she gasps, for Jason and her parents and for failing Hugo and everything she’s done since this all began. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry--”

“Fuckin’  **hold** him, Trent--easy, easy, stay with me--okay. Okay.” God… “Get him up. We’re gonna head back.”

Frank starts shuffling her...somewhere...and belatedly, she realizes she should let go. It can’t be easy for him, juggling her and his crutch.

“Is. Is he--”

“Mark’s gonna do his best. This isn’t your fault, but come on. Night comes early out here.”

* * *

Antoine does have Hugo, it turns out. He’s now telling him what Amicia thinks is a highly embellished story of a raid against the English, but he looks stressed and exhausted. She should take her brother. He’s her responsibility. But…

Hugo’s enthralled. And Frank is still holding her like Father used to do when she was a little girl, and she’s so tired.

They made it back, and Mark had Trent carry Jason somewhere, leaving everyone else to build a fire.

She can’t eat anything. She can barely  **move** . Today, she thinks, was the very last straw, just one more bad day on a heap of bad days.

Antoine’s story stops abruptly and he says, voice terse, “Well?”

“Well, he’s not dead yet,” Mark says from behind her. She didn’t even hear him come up. “I don’t know...he’s not dead yet.”

“He conscious?”

“In and out. He wants you and you.”

Antoine stands up, and then Frank gives her a nudge.

“Go on.”

“Me?”

“Yeah. It’s okay.”

No. No, it isn’t.

She follows Antoine, though, back to a little lean-to. Jason’s on a makeshift cot, buried in blankets. His breathing’s ragged and pained, but he manages to lift his head when they get close.

“Antoine.”

“Right here.” He crouches down and Jason grips his arm in trembling fingers.

“You take them. In the morning, you take them.”

What?

“‘Course.”

“The. The Inquisition should be gone. You’ll have a straight shot.”

No, no, no one else can help, she’s done enough!

“I can find it-!”

“Said. Said I’d getcha there. This’s.” He swallows, gives Antoine’s arm a weak shake. “This’s the next best. Pulled my ass outta more fires than I deserve.”

“That’s true,” Antoine says roughly. “You still owe me for the swamp. Dying isn’t going to let you off the hook.”

“It might.”

“It  **won’t** . I’ll take them. Just get some rest, okay?”

Jason goes limp with a soft groan, fingers slipping as his hand falls back to his side.

“‘Member what I said. ‘Bout Cobblepot.”

“I remember.”

“Good.”

“Come on,” Antoine says gently. “Get some rest, huh?”

He stands up, pulls her to her feet. But. But Jason needs to know, she never wanted, she never  **meant** \--

“I’m sorry,” she says frantically, trying not to cry again. It hasn’t been a good day for that. “I’m so sorry, Jason--”

“Not your fault.” He gives, or tries to give, a shadow of the cheeky grin he had yesterday. It vanishes when he shivers, to be replaced with a flash of absolute agony before he smooths his features out. “Not your fault, promise.”

But it  **is** . And she’s so, so sorry.

THE END

*Tod: a male fox. Also: German for ‘death’. I think I’m funny.


	21. I Don't Feel So Well

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Infection. Continuation of yesterday. (Jason’s right. He should be dead. Maybe magic, maybe mundane.)

When Jason was ten years old, he and his mother came down with influenza. Catherine Todd had died from it. Jason had been expected to. He doesn’t remember much, but he  **does** remember, vividly, sobbing and pleading to be allowed to attend her funeral. In the end, he had. He’d been bundled up in blankets and held like an infant, but he’d been there. The funeral itself is a blur of grief and fever, but he’d been there, and that had been what mattered.

The funeral, the influenza, those are lost to illness and time. The clearest memory he has is of a doctor saying, rather dismissively, that he was likely to be dead by daybreak. And that’s what’s ringing in his ears now, ten years later.

“--all right, you’re all right, just be still--”

_ “--give him his last rites--” _

He thinks he might be dying. His whole body hurts, he’s freezing and burning at the same time, and he can’t quite catch his breath.

“--with me now, come on--”

_ “--know that! You can’t possibly know that!” _

It’s worth it, he thinks hazily. If he can get one last  **fuck you** to those bastards calling themselves righteous men, then this is worth it. The De Rune children are safe. He kept his word.

“--a sip, please--”

_ “--his fever breaks, maybe--” _

He thinks Mama would have been proud of him. Or. He hopes she would have been. He knows she wouldn’t have wanted him to go off to war-Dove hadn’t, either, they’d had a shouting match over it the night before he left-but. He thinks she’d have been proud of him for doing the right thing.

He hopes Dove’ll be proud of him, too, if it ever gets back to her.

He’s sorry. He never should have gone, that was a mistake, and if he’ll be honest, he doesn’t want to die out here in the woods, where his body’ll likely be eaten by the rats. He wants to be next to Mama, he wants to have a chance to say good-bye to Dove.

He wants a lot of things.

It’s getting harder to breathe. He just...God help him, he wants to go home. He doesn’t want to die. He made his choice, and he doesn’t regret it, but. But  _ God, please… _

“--stubborn to die out here, come on--”

He surfaces from the depths of  _ pain _ and  _ memory _ with a sharp gasp that promptly turns to a pained cough that sends agony spiking through his whole body. Where...who…

Antoine, maybe?

“Hey. You awake?”

Yes. Yes, it is.

“Antoine.”

“Right here.”

Good.

“Tell.” Talking  **hurts** . “Tell Dove m’sorry.”

“You can--”

He fumbles until he finds an arm to grip and shakes his head.

**“Promise me.”**

“If it comes to that, sure.”

Good. Good. He lets go, draws in a few deeper breaths, and closes his eyes. The blankets get tucked tighter around him and he lets himself drift again.

He dreams of rats scurrying over his body, tails lashing against his lips as they burrow into the hole in him and keep  **moving** , wriggling through his chest and squirming up through his throat and climbing out over his teeth. Through it all, there’s a woman sobbing; he thinks it’s Mama. God help him, he can barely remember her voice.

Finally, mercifully, oblivion takes him.

* * *

Jason doesn’t know what day it is. Or where he is. Inside, he knows that; the surface under his body is soft: mattress. He’s warm, but comfortably so, and he feels cleaner than he has in months. There’s bandages wound snugly around his abdomen, and he has a pillow. And blankets.

Is he dead?

…

Is he  _ home? _

He can’t be. He’s dying, this is one last dream to make it kinder.

But...maybe…

He forces his eyes open. He’s in his own room; there’s his shelves, and his desk with his half-finished box on it. And Dove’s here, sitting by his bed like she’s always done when he’s sick. Well. She was sitting, at some point; she’s slumped over the bed now, head on her arms and hair a lost cause.

Maybe he’s not dying.

“Dove?”

She flinches, knitting tumbling from her lap, and sits up, reaches over to cup his cheek.

_“Jason.”_ Her hand’s warm. “You’re _awake_.” Yes? “God, you’re--you’re all right. You’re going to be all right, you’re _still_ _alive--_ ”

Her voice breaks and then she’s sobbing into his hair. This is bad. This is very bad. This is  **catastrophic** and he has no idea how to make it better.

“Uh-huh.”

Probably not that way.

“Dove,” he says again, a little helplessly. Then, because he doesn’t remember if he ever did, before he left, “M’sorry--”

“Jason--”

“M’sorry, m’so sorry, I never sh-should’ve--”

“Oh, honey, no, no.” She sits up and her thumbs flick across his cheeks and he realizes that he’s started crying, too. “Jay, I...don’t be sorry, sweetheart, you’re grown, I shouldn’t have--”

“I should’ve stayed home--”

“You were brave,” Dove says firmly, if a little thickly. “And I’m proud of you, and I  _ know _ Cathy would’ve been proud of you.” He starts sobbing in earnest now and stab be damned, he pushes himself up to hug her. “Jason, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, sweetheart.”

Home. He’s  _ home _ , he’s safe in his own bed and at the very least, he’s not going to die in the woods.

Dove gives him a hesitant squeeze and kisses the top of his head before murmuring, “Back down, Jason, please, you  _ really _ shouldn’t be sitting up.”

He shouldn’t be alive at all.

He does go back down, though, and there’s a definite relief when he does. Dove straightens his blankets and smooths his hair down.

“You hungry? Thirsty?”

“Mm-mm. Jus’ really tired.”

Silence settles over the room. It’s a comfortable one rather than a tense one, a welcome change to the silences of the past year. Lately, it’s been  _ don’t breathe don’t twitch don’t make a  _ **_sound_ ** . It’s been fear and desperation, not safety.

The fire crackles (scurrying the damned scurrying and squeaking and  **eating** ) and he flinches.

“Jay?”

There’s a sharp snap and he  **panics** . Rats. The rats are here, they’ve gotten in or he’s still in the woods and  **they’re coming** \--

He bolts up, looking frantically for his sword. Where is it, God, please, not the rats--

“--son. Jason!” Where is it? “Jay-- _ down _ .” He’s forced back down, body screaming in protest for what he’s just done. “Jay, you have to stay still.”

“The rats--”

“There’s no rats,” Dove soothes. “You’re just hearing the fire, sweetheart.”

Fire. Just the fire, he’s all right, it’s just the fire. He takes a deep breath and tries to calm down, heart still hammering in his chest.

“There were so many rats,” he admits. “There were so many rats, they just...the ground opened up and they were…”

_ “--be chokin’ on your own blood,” the man grins, advancing slowly. “You ‘ear me, boy? Your blood and my--no! NO!” _

“They ate people alive,” he finally finishes. “In. In seconds, they ate through armor*, there wasn’t…” He swallows. “I’ve never seen rats act like that.”

Dove makes a concerned noise and brushes the backs of her fingers against his cheek.

“Jason…”

“It’s  _ true _ ,” he insists, levers himself upright on shaking arms. “I saw it, they all saw it, I’m not…”

“That’s impossible.”

_ I should be dead _ , he thinks,  _ if we’re going to discuss the impossible. _

“But it’s true, they just--i-it was raining and they came out of the ground, hundreds on hundreds of ‘em, a-and…”

“Back down, please--”

“I saw them do it. I  _ saw  _ them.”

“Back  **down** , please.” She presses on his shoulders until he sinks back into his mattress, struggling to breathe and feeling his muscles trembling. “Now stay down, you’re...you’re not well.”

“I didn’t imagine them! Ask the others, they’ll tell you--”

“Shh.” She fusses with his blankets, smoothing them out and flicking bits of fluff off them. “Shh. That’s enough. You’re home, you’re going to be fine, now just...just calm down.”

“I didn’t imagine them,” he insists. “I  _ didn’t _ .”

Dove doesn’t look at all convinced, and he doesn’t have the strength to argue. It’s easier to just be still and pretend, as best he can, that nothing’s  **really** wrong. People survive injuries all the time, and he’s always been oddly lucky. And. And the rats. They were hungry, just hungry, and…

And he’ll never forget seeing the mangled, half-eaten bodies. And he should be  **dead** .

He shudders and squirms under his blankets. He feels terrible, light-headed and achy. His skin hurts, too, like dried pine needles are laid over it; hypersensitive and prickly. But he can breathe, and he doesn’t…

Maybe he’s a fool, but. He doesn’t think he’s dying. As insane as it sounds, he thinks he’s going to be all right.

He closes his eyes, represses a shudder at what he hopes is the crackling fire. No rats swarm him, and he’s comfortable and warm and so, so tired, and…

He’s safe. He can rest now.

THE END

  
  


*Unfortunately, Jason is not wrong: the rats in-game will devour a soldier (or you, if you wade into them) very quickly. It’s rather horrid.


	22. Do These Tacos Taste Funny To You?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Drugged.  
> So. In the first flashback, there is a tray of...medical...instruments, presumably borrowed from upstairs. They appear to be bloody.  
> Recommended mood music: Trevor Vaughan’s ‘Cut Here’.

Jason can barely keep his eyes open. He knows he should. He knows something is  **wrong** , but...he just. Everything hurts, and has hurt for who knows how long, now, and…

He can’t remember today. Tonight. Whatever. Which is a little weird, because, uh, usually he can. Remember, he means. Maybe not all of it-he thinks his trauma response kicks in sometimes and just checks him out, it’s happened before, as a kid-but most of it. Well, some of it.

More than  **nothing.**

He feels  **bad** , and his breath is hot and heavy and sour in his throat. He feels almost like he’s gonna puke, but he hasn’t eaten all day.

Maybe he’s gonna die.

He moistens his lips, or tries to, at least, and slumps forward as best he can. Honestly, this feels a lot like the time Richardson managed to nail him with some sort of proto-toxin she’d grabbed off a side table. Y’know, the kind you call 1-800-BAD DRUG for. He doesn’t think he could move his limbs if he tried, and his head hurts. But, like, not in the ‘got my skull slammed into the bricks’ kind of way. It hurts inside.

From miles away, there’s a door squeaking open, followed by footsteps. He tries to lift his head, can’t, and just ends up quietly resigned to whatever’s going to happen to him. There’s the sound of wheels, then swearing and grunting, and then…

Then he’s being released from the chair. Bruce?

Not Bruce. He sees a purple haze to the left. He should fight back. Robin fights back, keeps fighting until he’s fuckin’ dead, but...Jason’s gonna throw up if he moves too quick.

**Toughen up, c’mon!**

It’s no use. He can barely see more than blurs, and any words being spoken are just...not computing. He’s dragged from the chair and hefted up, onto something hard and flat. Bed? No, he realizes belatedly, gurney. Gurneys have a special sorta squeak.

Hands paw at his uniform until he’s stripped to the waist, but by the time he convinces his arms to push whoever it is away, he’s being strapped down.

Something cold and wet-cloth?-scrubs over his torso, scraping off scabs and making the oh-God-I-will-HURL feeling worse. Then there’s a new pain, lancing agony cutting through the soft hollow spot just under his ribs.

He can’t even scream. He’s ten years old all over again and while his brain is protesting, his body is limp and pliable and  _ God what are they doing to me? _

Something cold and metal nudges around inside him, and the voices above him suddenly come into focus, like a well-tuned television.

“--work?”

“Of course. If he escapes, all you’ll have to do is go online.”

Tracker.

They’ve put a tracker in him.

_ He’ll never get away from them. _

The cold metal thing inside him draws back out and a minute later, the stitches begin. He thinks his eyes are closed. They must be; he can feel tears on his lashes, but no cold-wet-air on his eyeballs.

_ God… _

When he wakes, he’s dressed and in the chair. Nothing hurts more than usual. There’s a tray of bloodied surgical tools next to him, but honestly, he can’t be sure if any of that happened at all.

_ Bruce, where are you? _

THE END


	23. What's A Whumpee Gotta Do To Get Some Sleep Around Here?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Exhaustion.  
> Eh, more like...future-whump. Bittersweet whump. Look-how-good-it-was-before-Joker-happened whump.

Bruce put autopilot in the Batmobile for a  _ reason. _

He melts into the cushy, ergonomic seat and silently thanks his past self before moving just wrong and  _ thanking _ Basil Karlo for punching him into a wall tonight.

His back is killing him.

But that’s all right, because Past Bruce installed an autopilot and more importantly, Jason doesn’t even have a scratch. It’s late, though, another late night in a string of them, and normally Robin wouldn’t have been out past ten, but there’s been a minor crime wave and it’s summer vacation.

…

And he’s trying to show that he trusts him to handle things. That’s been a...source of tension, lately.

To put it mildly.

Jason is asleep right now, curled up in his cape with his mask in his hand. He’s breathing softly through his mouth and Bruce wishes those shadows under his eyes weren’t there. Jason, he knows, views them as a badge of honor, but Bruce…

If there was a way for Jason to take it as an expression of care, rather than a brutal dismissal, Bruce would have him be a normal boy, up late playing video games rather than fighting criminals.

But that won’t go over well, and he knows it, and Jay’s  _ flourished _ in the cape. Bruce doesn’t have the heart to take that from him. Not after the rough start he’s had.

Jason murmurs something indistinct and nestles into his cape. Bruce quietly reprograms the autopilot to take the longer route. He must be tired; for Jason, sleeping in front of people is a no-way, I’ll-be-dying-first activity. Bruce’s back can wait a few more minutes for its shower.

All too soon, they arrive anyway. With Dick, Bruce would have gotten him out of the car, at least. With Jason, that’s asking to be bitten. Dick had made the mistake of picking him up once-while he was awake, mind-and, uh, Bruce had poked his head in at the screams, seen the flailing knot, and gone to hide in his study. They were fine. They hadn’t needed him in any way.

But he’s not going to make that mistake. Oh, no. As bad as he feels about it, he is going to wake this child.

In a minute.

Now.

Right now.

_ Now. _

“Jay?” he murmurs, stepping back in case of a violent reaction. “Jason.”

“Hrm…?”

“Wake up, Jay-lad, we’re home for the night.”

“Night,” Jason mumbles agreeably, snuggling into his cape again. “See ya in th’ mornin’, Bruce.”

“No, Jay. It’s time to get up and shower off. Come on.”

He groans but shuffles out of the car. Bruce suffers through Alfred’s tutting-all right, so the bruise is bad, but it  _ could _ have been  _ worse _ , Alfred, remember when he got shot multiple times by the SWAT team*?-and by the time he turns around, Jason’s come back out and gone back to sleep in the computer chair.

This is either going to go off without a hitch or it’s going to go so badly that he’ll have to delete the cave footage.

Bruce approaches the chair, giving Jason plenty of time to wake up on his own, but this does not happen and he finally picks him up, inwardly bracing for pain. But Jason just yawns and presses his head into Bruce’s shoulder. Good.

He settles Jason in his bed and is nearly out the door when he is...slightly surprised...to hear him mumble, “G’night, ol’ man.”

“Good night, Jason.”

THE END

* _ Year One _ . The SWAT team regretted their life choices.


	24. You're Not Making Any Sense

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blindfolded. Well. In a way.

Jason’s been sitting here for who knows how long, hands clutching the arms of the chair, barbed wire digging into his skin. Somebody’s stuck a bag on his head and he’s honestly half-expecting there to be a ransom tape made soon, but...but it doesn’t matter. It’s been a long time.

There’s footsteps on the stairs, quiet, so very quiet, and he tries to swallow down the desperate  **hope** .

“Hello?” he calls, trying to sound brave. “Is someone there?”

There’s no answer. Maybe. Maybe they didn’t hear him.

“Please...please help me.”

He’d help himself if he could, but. The wire. He fought back, fought back hard, and when he woke up again, the ropes had been supplemented with it and now moving too much digs it into his skin, presses it into his armor. His neck is bleeding, on and off, and so’s the exposed skin at his wrists.

The footsteps come up to the chair and he feels body heat. Who the hell…

“Wh-what’re you waiting for?” 

If he could just  _ see _ ...

Fingers skim over the back of his neck, pressing the rough bag into tender skin, and he flinches. He knows. He knows who’s here.

“Not again,” he begs, because sometimes...sometimes it works. “Please don’t do it again.  _ Please. _ ”

The fingers rub the top of his head and he jerks away, punishment be damned. Then they pull away, and the footsteps back up. No. No more, no more of these goddamn games. This bastard is going to have to kill him, Jason’s not. Going. To play. Anymore.

“Just do it, for God’s sake!”  **Where is he.** “Do it!”

**God...God help me...somebody, please…**

Bruce coming for him. He knows it. He has to, he’s  **Batman.** He comes for everybody, he’ll come for Jason, he  **has** to.

Doesn’t he?

The footsteps scurry back up the stairs and the door slams. Jason doesn’t breathe, trying to hear anything that might hint that he’s not alone down here, but everything’s silent.

_ Bruce, where  _ **_are_ ** _ you? _

THE END


	25. I Think I'll Just Collapse Right Here, Thanks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disorientation. Incredibly not canon compliant, but hey.

Jason’s not sure he’s ever been so sick.

He has no idea how this happened. Last night he was fine, this morning he can’t even get out of bed thanks to the bone-chattering chills. He managed to send a Do Not Disturb, Doing Important Things e-mail before passing back out, but now it’s after ten and he feels like he’s dying. His body aches like the Joker’s just beaten him with that damn crowbar and his nose isn’t stuffy, it’s swollen shut.

He’s curled up under his blankets, shuddering and wondering if this is how it ends, when there’s a small  **beep!** from the floor. Huh…?

Oh. The Roomba. The damn thing keeps escaping. He’s not sure how, because he’s pretty sure it’s not supposed to just wander on its own, but it always comes back and it’s never been hurt. He pokes his head out and looks down, face suddenly flooded with heat and pain. Nothing’s wrong with it, it’s just going under the bed for dust bunnies. There aren’t any, and it’s probably just because he’s sick, but he feels bad that it’s not needed today.

He shreds part of a tissue and drops it down. There. Now it won’t worry that he’s going to get rid of it for being useless.

“G’night, little buddy,” he mumbles, burrowing back into his blanket cocoon. By the time the Roomba emerges again, he’s dead to the world.

* * *

All right. So they’re not...panicking, exactly, it’s just…

Yeah, they’re panicking.

So. They got a mass e-mail from the Knight that Antoine thinks was supposed to be a ‘do not disturb’ type. It’s about a paragraph long, pretty standard, but it’s riddled with typos and errors. The boss is one of those people that will sooner die than let a typo go. He’s probably got opinions on the Oxford Comma or some shit, he’s one of  **those** people.

And he’s missing.

Mark threw respect and protocol out the window and dragged Trent over there to kick the door down, because  **clearly** something is  **wrong** , and, uh...there was no Knight inside. Roomba, yeah, but no Knight.

So yup, they’re panicking that something’s gone horribly wrong. It’s the only explanation.

Well, apart from, ‘this is a new training thing’, but it doesn’t feel like a new training thing.

He’s not in any of his usual spots. Not that there’s many, but as a general rule, you can find him in his quarters, in the Drone Warehouse, or in the simulation room (but for that one, you have to be quiet and lucky, because he likes to hide up on the gargoyles). He’s not in any of the public areas, either. Not the mess hall, not the computer room, not...anywhere. It’s like he’s vanished.

They-Frank, mostly, because they’re prototypes and finicky-have mobilized the new drones, the flying ones with sensors, to see if they can track him down. So far there’s been four false positives and one charred toad to show for their efforts, but no Knight.

Antoine’s just about to suggest they all start checking under beds, because he is out of ideas, when there’s a flash of blue over by the main gate.

“Found him,” he says, mutes his radio just as Mark starts threatening to stick a tracker in him so this doesn’t happen again. “Sir, where’ve you  _ been? _ We’ve been looking all over for you.”

The boss, who’d been steadily shuffling closer, freezes in his tracks. Okay. Little creepy, but okay.

“Sir?”

Silence. Somewhere in the jungle, a bird starts screeching, but that’s it.

“Uh, you okay, boss?”

The Knight tilts his head a little bit. Ordinarily, that’s not anything. Today? It’s...unsettling. Something’s not right; Antoine is really, really starting to sympathize with every  _ Friday the 13th _ counselor.

Oh, fuck, this isn’t, like,  _ Invasion of the Body Snatchers _ or something, is it? Or worse, the zombie apocalypse?

“Sir?” Don’t move. Stay nice and calm. “Arkham Knight? You, uh, you feeling okay?”

He straightens up and Antoine is just starting to consider turning his radio back on when he finds himself staring down the barrel of a gun.

Shit.

Okay. Okay. Don’t move. Don’t do anything that could appear remotely threatening. He can talk his way out of this.

Probably.

Maybe.

Theoretically.

There’s movement-Trent, turns out-and the boss doesn’t even look before drawing his other sidearm and aiming it at him. Logically, they should be able to take him. But then again, Antoine knows he’s got smoke pellets and probably other nasty surprises in his belt, so.

“Sir,” he says carefully, holding his hands up, “this isn’t, um. This isn’t necessary, okay? We’re not going to hurt you.”

Silence. Okay. He hasn’t been shot yet, that’s a good sign. Right?

“Just. Just put the guns down, okay? Everything’s gonna be fine, just. Just put the guns down.”

When nothing bad happens to him, he risks taking a step forward.

**BLAM!**

Shit--no. No, he’s okay, and Trent’s okay. That was a warning shot. Warning received.

“Okay. My bad. I’m gonna stay right here, okay?”

**“Not doing this again.”**

Antoine hates that moderator. Is it the Knight under there? Who knows. Not him. 

“No, sir,” he says agreeably. “I’m gonna stay here, and Trent’s gonna stay there, and we’re gonna talk this out, okay?”

**“Not fucking doing this again.”**

“Mind explaining what you mean, boss? I’m, uh, I’m not exactly a mind reader, but I’m happy to help if I can.” Calm. Friendly. Like talking to strange children! “We’re not gonna hurt you. I promise.”

**“Stay back.”**

“I am, sir. I’m staying right here.”

Trent backs up a few feet, which helps some; that gun goes down. The Knight’s wobbling a little where he stands. Okay. This is fine. This is going to be just fine.

**“Not again. M’not doing this again.”**

“‘Course not, boss. Just. Just maybe put the gun down, okay? We’re going to help you, I promise.”

He does, to Antoine’s infinite amazement, put the gun down. Takes three shaky steps forward.

And goes down.

Mark appears out of nowhere and shoves him onto his back. Antoine lets out a breath he’d forgotten he was holding and inches closer.

“Jesus, he’s burning up...hey, boss. Can you hear me?”

The boss just groans. Mark frowns and before anybody can stop him, he’s feeling around the helmet. There’s a couple of clicks and it...expands, kind of, enough for Mark to pull it off.

There is a human under there. A teenager, a scarred-up  _ teenager _ \--wait. Wait just one minute, Antoine’s seen him before, this’s…

Holy shit, this is  _ Robin _ , the one Joker got to, from that awful tape they had to watch last month.

Holy  **fucking** Mary on a moldy bagel.

“Christ, that’s a high fever...Trent, get over here and get him up, I have no idea if something’s infected or what...gonna fucking  **kill** him for keeping this from me, I swear to God…”

The Knight-Robin, what the hell-groans when Trent picks him up, but he’s silent otherwise.

What. A. Day.

* * *

Jason wakes up to an unfamiliar ceiling and, to put it bluntly, completely freaks out. He’s not doing this again, he’ll die first--

“--r. Sir! It’s--oh, come on, how even--” He’s forced back onto what proves to be a bed. “Mark is gonna kill us both if you disappear again…”

Huh?

Okay. Okay. Assess.

He feels like shit, first of all. The body aches say flu, but the swollen, throbbing face says sinus infection. Or maybe it’s something else…

Second of all, it’s not a totally unfamiliar ceiling. It’s Medical. Which makes sense, if Mark Jones is involved in this.

But he has no idea how he got here or what’s going on...wait. Shit.  **Helmet.**

Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck.

“Sir? You, uh, okay?” Drouot. Why is he here? What is going on? “You’re not gonna, um. Freak out again, right?”

What the hell happened? He went to bed, he remembers going to bed, and then...then he was here...no. No, that’s not right. He remembers, very vaguely, going for a walk to clear his head. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. But it had not been a good idea, because Joker-- **Joker.**

Where is he, how did he get in, they have security--

“Easy! Easy. Whatever you think you need to be doing, you probably don’t.”

He’s going to kill that fucking clown.

“We have an intruder,” he grinds out, deciding to just go with the idea that if he doesn’t mention his lack of helmet, it just won’t come up. Drouot gives him an odd look. 

“You wouldn’t have held this intruder at gunpoint, would you, sir?”

…

Maybe?

“Hm.”

“You were really, really out of it, sir.”

“S’that s’posed ta mean.”

“There’s no intruder, sir.” Bullshit. “S’just us.”

But it isn’t. Jason saw him, he knows he did, he just…

He saw him, didn’t he?

“Maybe go back to sleep, boss. You look awful.”

But his helmet. And Joker. And the small matter of how he got here.

“No.”

“Your funeral.”

Could be. That kind of fuck-up is hard to come back from. Christ, how does this happen,  _ why now? _

He risks turning to see if he can maybe make a break for it-now that he knows Drouot is here, he can probably fight him off and find the damn clown himself-and spots his helmet. The eyes aren’t glowing, but it’s not hurt.

His helmet is here. Maybe there is no Joker. Why would Joker be in South America?

Then again, there was that one time Bruce tracked him to fuckin’ Ethiopia, so.

But…

He’s going to get up and explore on his own. Then he can deal with this mess. Just. In a minute. In a minute.

When he’s not so dizzy.

One more minute.

One...more...minute…

_ Zzz. _

THE END


	26. If You Thought the Head Trauma Was Bad

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Concussion. Continuation of ‘Broken Hearts’.

Harvey Bullock regrets getting out of bed this morning. His coffee pot was broken. The donut shop by his house was closed due to rat infestation. And now the goddamn Iceberg Lounge has been blasted to Kingdom Come, which means Cobblepot is pissed as shit. Gordon has Penguin duty, which is a small blessing, but Harvey is now in the unenviable position of being the first one Dove saw upon arriving, which means he gets the brunt of that.

“--damn clown cult,” she’s seething now. Twenty feet away, Cobblepot is raving at Gordon, hobbling back and forth and gesturing at the flaming Iceberg. “I  **thought** we were done with this nonsense.”

“Didn’t we all.”

“This is  **bullshit** , what the hell is Batman for if he’s not dealing with these nuts?”

True.

“Technically--”

“No. No. I did not drag my flu-ridden ass outta bed for my damn place of employment to be blown up by a bunch’a little shits that’d just love to suck the Joker’s decaying--”

That is not a mental picture he wanted. It’s true, but still.

“Dove--”

“If it was Harley, I’d get that, but these sorry bastards--”

“Dove--”

She sucks in a pained breath, coughs, and puffs up further.

“And what the hell do we pay  **you** for? We pay taxes! And I sure as  **fuck** don’t pay taxes for you to sit on your collective asses while Joker’s little flunkies get together-again!-and blow shit up! If these little  **fuckers** aren’t brought up on every charge you can muster--”

Hey!

“That’s enough--”

“--and even some fraudulent charges,  **I don’t care** \--”

Oh, bullshit. Enough is enough.

“If your boss wasn’t running illegal guns all over the place, this wouldn’t be a problem,” he snaps. “He’s a magnet for this crap and you know it--”

“Fucking prove it, Harvey. Go ahead and try.”

“Oh, I will-- **Christ!** ” 

Harvey had no idea Red Hood was even in the area. He doesn’t leave Crime Alley very often. Or at least, he’s not seen outside of it very often, but hey, Bat-bullshit. But he’s here now, all six feet and two hundred pounds of him. His helmet’s cracked-was he in that blast?  **Is this his fault?** -and he should arrest him. Or try to. It’s just…

Hood was Robin, once. And Harvey remembers the mouthy punkass who gave him no respect except when it really mattered, who made it...it’s sappy, he knows, but…

Harvey’s made mistakes in life. A lot of ‘em, bad ones. But he’s tryin’ to do the right thing, and...Robin, the second one,  _ this _ one, he’d...he’d gotten it, kinda. Which sounds weird and also oddly pathetic, but, well, Harvey’d been fond of the little brat. It hadn’t been a good day when the news came that Joker had...done what he had.

And now, well, look. Harvey tries to do the right thing. But sometimes, the right thing is the not-nice thing. If he had a dollar for every creep that walked away for lack of evidence, he’d have a nicer apartment.

But  **still** .

“What the hell?” He demands. “What are you doing here?”

“Your job, probably,” Dove snaps. “Fantastic...if I see Batman, he’s getting an earful…”

Hood is singed and his helmet’s busted. He’s also weirdly quiet. Dove turns back to Harvey, clearly winding up for more rage, and starts coughing again. Hood manages, somehow, to radiate alarm.

The coughing stops and Dove fishes a cough drop out of her bag. Before she can resume raving, Hood speaks.

“You’re not dead.”

Little weird, that. Dove doesn’t appear to notice.

“No, hon. Now. Harvey. What is going to be done about--”

_ “You’re not dead.” _

That gets her attention, cuts her off and makes her twist over.

“Hood, what in the-- _ Hood! _ ”

That’s a hug. A scary-looking hug, but a hug nonetheless.

He’s talking. Quietly, frantically, but there are words coming out of his mouth.

“--floor went out an’ I couldn’t get to her in time an’ I thought--I thought--” He swallows. “She looked like you. She looked like you.”

Dove pats his ribs; all she can reach, looks like, given the circumstances.

“She wasn’t me, whoever it was. Clearly. I just got here.”

Hood’s shaking. The helmet keeps Harvey from seeing if he’s crying or just freaked, but he’s visibly trembling and wow, he does not envy Dove this at  **all** . 

“She looked like you,” he keeps mumbling. “I thought…”

Oh.

Oh, Jesus.

They’d found a head, early on. The face had been charred beyond recognition, but what was left of the hair had indeed been blonde. Honestly, the head had been hard to stomach-that kind of damage always is-but, uh. It’s no wonder Hood’s...upset.

“All right, hon, all right,” Dove’s saying now. “I’m  _ fine _ . But can you let go? I need a tissue, and, uh, I think you’ve managed to realign my spine.”

“Sorry--”

“Shh. Just let go, huh? I’m not going to vanish.”

He pulls back but stays well within grabbing distance while Dove rummages through her bag until she comes up with a little pocket pack of Kleenex.

“Fuck this…” she mutters. “Most useless symptom...absolute bullshit, like all the  _ other _ symptoms weren’t enough…”

Harvey hopes she’s going to stop yelling at him now.  **He** didn’t blow up the Iceberg. For all he knows, Hood’s the responsible party here. Speaking of…

“What are you doing here?”

“Tracked one ‘em.” His voice is thick, helmet be damned. “Caught up here, I just. I wasn’t quick enough-- **shit** \--”

He gags and frantically steps away. The faceplate goes up seconds before he hurls, bile spattering on the asphalt.

Neat...wait.

“Were you  **in** there?”

“Uh-huh.” He’s real still now, breathing heavy. “Sorry...uh-huh. Floor. Floor went out from under me.”

“Come here.” Doctor he aint, but he knows how to check for concussion. “Keep that helmet open.”

Hood hisses and pulls away from the penlight.

“I know I have a concussion,” he grumbles. “I always puke when I end up with one. Every damn time.”

...good to know.

Dove starts coughing again and Hood’s half-straightened up when she holds up a finger.

“Flu,” she wheezes when it’s over. “Jus’ tail end of the damn flu. Make ya a deal. You go home and deal with that, an’ I’m gonna go home and go back to bed.”

Hood hugs her again, more carefully than before, and grapples up to a nearby roof. Dove straightens herself out and looks back at Harvey.

“I’ll be expecting a call tomorrow, Detective,” she says shortly. “Preferably informing me that you’ve caught these jackasses. Good night.”

THE END


	27. Okay, Who Had Natural Disasters On Their 2020 Bingo Card?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Power outage.

Jason wakes up shivering and finds that at some point, he’s made the stupid mistake of rolling over (his left shoulder is the worst shoulder, and it will make him regret this very shortly) and tried to wrap himself around Lemon like a child with a giant teddy bear. Lemon, for her part, is curled into a ball and is also shivering.

The hell happened to the heat?

Confused exploring and a quick check with his next-door-neighbor gives him the answer: power outage, probably due to the storm.

Oh, boy.

Jason does not tolerate cold. He’ll die before he’s cold again. For once, it’s not even Joker’s fault; he’s hated the cold since he was a little boy left to fend for himself at ten years old.

Gotham winters are nasty.

Unfortunately, there’s not much he can do about this now other than put Lemon’s coat and hat on before changing into sweats and digging out extra blankets for both of them to huddle under. Lemon, the lucky one, goes back to sleep. Jason can’t.

Sure, he hates to be cold, hates the way the back of his mind always starts going in circles about  **gonna die gonna die** , but nowadays...nowadays cold brings a different problem. Namely, it aggravates old injuries and makes his joints, overworked and underpaid as they are, absolutely  **ache** . 

If the heat doesn’t come back soon, he won’t be going out for the next few days. He’ll be lucky if he can get out of bed.

The aches start gradually, just a niggle. It’s a toss-up as to whether it’s his left shoulder, his right knee, or his left ankle that starts it, but once somebody starts waving the pain flag, everybody else joins in, followed shortly after by sharp cracking when he moves too fast or puts too much weight on the offended whatever, and by the end of it, he’s going to be miserable.

Ohh, this is gonna suck.

He makes himself as comfortable as possible and closes his eyes, hoping he can get a little more rest before this gets worse.

* * *

He is not successful at getting any more rest. An hour passes and he’s breathing as slowly and deliberately as possible and trying to pretend everything’s fine. It isn’t.

He’s lying stiff and awkward with one arm curled around Lemon and the other crooked at his side like a puppet’s. His back hurts and his fingers are cold.

**Fuck clowns,** he thinks viciously.  **And fuck that one Riddler goon that broke my arm when I was fourteen and one day old.**

He wants tea and his electric blanket and a hot shower, but he can’t risk the shower. He took a Dark Shower once and, uh, had a bit of a flashback to one of Harley’s Baths. So here he is and here he stays, hoping this ends soon.

If he breathes deep and keeps his eyes closed, the pain will ebb. The problem is that it’s pitch black and he doesn’t do well in pitch black. Brings back memories.

_ “No-no, please no--” _

He shudders and squirms closer to the dog, who thuds her tail on the bed. He’s okay. He’s okay.

“I ever tell you how I met Bruce, sour girl?” he mumbles. Maybe it’s dumb, to talk to the dog like she’s a person. But he’s hurting and two steps from a freakout and there is no one else. “Thought I’d steal the tires off the Batmobile. He parked it in Crime Alley, like an idiot, and I just...happened upon it, and, ah, thought I’d make the rent.”

Lemon twists over to look at him.

“Don’t judge me, I was small and poor.”

She burps in his face.

Ugh.

THE END

  
  



	28. Such Wow. Many Normal. Very Oops.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Accidents. Or, poking loving fun at the fact that Robin Jason was a bitty baby and that Red Hood Jason is not.

Jason stares at the door frame that just assaulted his already bruised head. He has no idea what just happened. He was going to brush his teeth, and then, uh,  **whammo** , his head and the frame came together like a couple’a taxis on Broadway.

It’s been a grand total of three days since he left, and this is new to him. Sure, he’s slammed his shoulders into the frame several times, because he’s clumsy on that ankle, but his head?

…

He shuffles into the bathroom, one eye fixed on the attacking frame, and looks, really looks, at himself.

He’s thin. Bruised and scabbed and scarred. But you know, now that he’s gotten some sleep, and some food, and started to calm down about this being a nice dream or Mad Hatter bullshit, he’s a little more observant, and he’s...

Taller.

Somehow, some-fucking-how, he  **grew** . Who’d have thought?

…

Yeah, that’s gonna be a fun bruise to hide. Ouch.

* * *

For the past week, Jason’s been a fan of the bath. He hasn’t trusted his ankle to hold him in a slipper shower and, quite frankly, baths are great. They’re warm and luxurious and sue him, he got some sort of bath bomb on a whim because it was shaped like a Storm Trooper head and it was very entertaining. He may or may not have gotten more.

But showers are different, and he’s thinking he wants to try one. Partly he feels like having pounding water rather than sloshing water, but mostly it’s because he doesn’t fit in the tub very well. Either his knees are cold or his chest is cold. There is no winning.

So here he is, a little wobbly but mostly fine, enjoying the crappy water pressure. It feels good on his aching muscles and it’s...sort of...similar to someone scritching the top of his head. If he closes his eyes. And tries not to think about it.

The shampoo tries to make a break for his eyes and he tips back, hands going to his hair, and--

“Mother **fucker!** ”

**Mama, I’ve been hit!**

The shower head is really, really hard and honestly pokey. Oww...that’s gonna leave a mark.

* * *

He’s better about the door frame. The shower is a recurring problem, but he’s getting there. But now there’s a new horror.

The bedside lamp.

He’s had some near misses already, misjudging the distance needed to pull the chain. And today...today has been mildly catastrophic.

The lamp lies lifeless on the floor, bulb shattered, shade bent, and cord ripped half-out of the base where it tried to save itself by snagging on the nightstand. This is all his fault. He’d reached out to turn it on, and he’d been closer than needed, and, he’d basically smacked it to the ground.

Oops.

He tucks the offending arm against his chest, where it won’t cause further damage, and crouches down. Pokes a shard of lightbulb. Immediately cuts into his index finger.

He deserves that.

THE END


	29. I Think I Need A Doctor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reluctant bedrest.  
> This is a continuation of ‘Please’, which was NOT supposed to happen, BUT I had a WEIRD-ASS dream involving me, a friend I had to drop for Reasons, and some rando we were trying to save kittens from. Friend decided to love the rando and start galloping around on all fours. Dream Me was all, ‘geeze, again? You always do this’, but Waking Me was just, ‘...the fuck was that’.  
> This is late-ish because Mr. Lucas had his neuter yesterday (whoo!)...but I’m the only person he likes right now, because I didn’t take him there. :/ So I’ve been busy.

Hood argues his way out of a hospital and into some back alley clinic that looks like it barely has power on a good day, let alone tonight. Dove and Nicole end up staying with him rather than keep walking in the dark, and Bullock has returned to doing whatever it is he does. Eating donuts, or whatever.

The clinic is  _ empty _ , save for an ancient doctor who apparently knew Dove when she was a little girl and a nurse who looks...a little off. But they’re both really nice, and Hood doesn’t seem overly freaked out, so, uh. Yeah.

Hood’s out of surgery now, has been for...half an hour? Nicole’s not sure. It’s been a long night. He’s loopy from the drugs and is, currently, rambling about his neighbor’s chihuahua.

“--fuckin’ tiny li’l thing,” he’s saying, measuring awkwardly with scarred hands. “Like. The puppies must be  _ teeny _ , this thing’ll fit inna casserole pan.”

“S’that so?”

“Mm-hm. I didn’ know dogs came tha’ small, an’ s’weird, an’.” He gulps, suddenly weepy. “A-an’ it’s got thissss. This pink fur coat with th’ li’l fake diamonds on it an’ it’s the cutest thing ‘ve ever seen in my  _ life _ .”

No one will ever believe her if she says that the Red Hood is crying about his neighbor’s chihuahua’s pink fur coat with rhinestones on it.

Dove just ruffles his hair and tells him to try and sleep. Nicole wonders where the sun is. They’ve been here for hours, they must have been, because wounds like that don’t get stitched up in thirty seconds or whatever like they do in the movies*. But it’s still dark outside, and inside too, except for the little night light and Dove’s phone.

“Boss says to sit tight,” Dove says, and Nicole wonders what she told him. She doubts he’d be happy to hear the truth. “I guess there’s...there’s some sorta second wave of those things, I don’t know.”

What?

They’re not gonna try to come in, right? She’s sure they can; if one of them could pick Hood up and carry him like that, surely they can just bust down the door like the Kool-Aid Man.

“Okay.”

“You good? There used to be a vending machine here if you want coins.”

She’ll puke if she eats.

“I’m okay. Thanks.”

“I want coins,” Hood grumbles. “I want cherry Pop-Tarts.”

“No, honey.”

He huffs and settles under his sheet a little more, eyes steadily drifting shut. He’s asleep, and Nicole’s honestly considering trying to take a nap in the chair, when there’s a loud crash out in the hall.

What  _ was _ that?

She gets up and shuffles to the door. It’s dark out there-guess the emergency power doesn’t cover hall lights?-but there’s a tipped-over cart at the end of the hall where there  _ is _ a light. It’s eerie, that light, silhouetting the fallen cart and a person.

Then things go from eerie to horrifying.

The person is still, standing over the cart, and at first Nicole thinks this is, like, the third time they’ve done this and they’re just so  _ done _ . That was her, one week, when she bumped into the same damn table every single time she dropped by to check on it. So, like, thirty times in a night. It was awful.

And then the person  **screams.**

It’s a...a primal shriek, long and shrill and  _ loud _ , loud enough to startle Hood awake and get him half-upright before he stops himself.

“The hell--?”

“Nicole?” Dove gets up, cracking and cursing the weather, and comes over. “What in the world…”

The scream cuts off. The person staggers forward a few steps, palms smacking against the wall as they apparently try to steady themselves, and then they...they just…

They run. It’s a painful-looking, shambling run, but they’re coming this way  _ they’re coming this way-- _

She yanks the door shut. It doesn’t lock, but Dove pulls over the spare visitor’s chair to shove under the knob.

“Get down,” Hood hisses, and Nicole drops, tries not to breathe. The footsteps go past the door, down to the other end of the hall, and fade. Then everything’s quiet.

When nothing horrible happens, she stands back up, peeks out the window. Nothing.

“What was that?”

Dove shrugs.

“I don’t know. Just. Don’t go out there, okay? No vending machine after all- _ what are you doing. _ ”

What, what? She’s not doing anything--oh.

Hood’s moving like he’s going to get up, like he didn’t just have a piece of rebar taller than he is rammed through his body. What the hell?

“Investigating,” he says, voice tight. “Something’s wrong--”

“Don’t be dumb.”

“M’fine, ‘ve had worse.”

Worse? What kind of worse?

Then again, she thinks, trying not to look at the brand on his face, maybe she doesn’t want to know.

“There is nothing you can do, let it alone--”

“I can help--”

“Help yourself to an early grave, maybe. Stop it.  _ Now. _ ”

“But--”

“Nicole could fight you and win.” Don’t make her prove this. “Just don’t.”

Hood pouts. That is a pout. It’s...creepy.

But not as creepy as the runner outside.

She forgoes the chair in favor of huddling on the floor and hugging her knees. Dove just settles back in her chair, doing something on her phone, and Hood’s attention has focused on the door. He’s breathing hard through his nose and sometimes he’ll close his eyes for a few seconds too long, but he doesn’t look like he’s going back to sleep.

“Apparently,” Dove says suddenly, “there’s...they’re not sure if this is contagious or if it’s, like, something dormant in the blood, I don’t know what half these words even are, but basically, these things were people. Are people, maybe, I don’t...I don’t know if there’s a cure or what or...or what.”

Before Nicole can process that, there’s footsteps in the hall again. Skipping? Sounds like someone skipping.

_ Please go away… _

Dove turns off the light, plunging the room into darkness, and then the only sounds are the skipping and Hood’s pained breathing. Then the skipping stops.

_ Are they gone? _

**THUD!**

She yelps; she can’t help it. That was something slamming against the door, making it shake in its frame. It doesn’t happen again. There’s just giggling-sounds like a woman?-and the skipping starts up again, goes down the hall.

“What the fuck?” she whispers. “What the fuck--”

“Shh,” Dove says softly. “We’re okay. Just be quiet, we’re okay, they didn’t come in.”

“They know we’re here, they know we’re here, they know we’re here--”

“Hey. Nicole.” Shit, he remembers her name. She doesn’t want this. “S’gonna be okay, huh?”

“But--”

“S’gonna be. Be okay. Promise, we’re gonna be f-fine.”

She doesn’t want to die.

Hood pulls in a deep breath and levers himself upright.

“I c’n probably jus’--”

“No.”

“But--”

“No.”

He huffs and slumps back. Nicole arguably hates this more than before; at least before, there was somewhere to run. This is why  _ Five Nights at Freddy’s _ scared her so badly; being trapped there, just  _ waiting _ ...her coworkers all make fun of her when they find out that scares her, but it does. She can’t help it. She didn’t grow up here, she’s not used to literal clay-men rampaging around and absorbing people!

Dove sets her phone aside and the last scrap of light is gone. Hood’s quiet and still and Nicole remembers with a jolt that he’s probably  _ good _ at being quiet and still, because he’s an assassin or whatever.

She kind of wants to ask him what his plan was. Just...it’s so quiet, in here, too quiet, and hearing another voice would be helpful. But maybe the plan involved ripping the person’s head off or something, so.

“Um.” Her voice comes out squeaky. “Do. Do we call anyone?”

“No one to call.”

“Will. Will Batman come?”

Silence. Then Dove says, voice just too tight to be neutral, “I don’t know.”

Hood laughs a little.

“His track record’s shit.”

“What do you mean?” He helps people, right? Isn’t that his thing? “I thought…”

“Rule number four in Gotham, kid: don’t rely on Batman to save you.”

But…

**_“I CAN RUN!”_ ** something screams in the hall.  **_“JUST LIKE THE OTHERS!”_ **

What?

**_THUMP-BUD THUMP-BUD THUMP-BUD--_ **

She stands up, looks out just as a...person?...kind of gallops by, limbs elongated past what they should be. People don’t move like that, like an insect, almost, lurching side to side. There’s the skidding of shoes outside, then the awful  **_THUMP-BUD_ ** again, and  _ then _ the person’s pressed up against the door, face against the glass.

They don’t look right. They- **it** -is blackish purple, like a walking bruise, with bulging, bleeding eyes and teeth that hang forward like they’ve been  **ripped** forward and half-out of the gums.

And it’s grinning.

“Oh God-!”

**WHAM!**

Twisted, broken fists slam against the door hard enough to make it shake. Nicole’s frozen to the spot, vision going dark.

_ Oh God oh God oh God-- _

Someone pulls her back. The thing outside starts giggling, but the giggles quickly turn to either sobs or screams.

**BLAM!**

Glass shatters. The thing falls back. She can’t hear anything over the ringing in her ears, but she can just make out Hood collapsing back onto his bed, gun slipping from his fingers before she faints.

THE END

  
  
  


*Gotham runs on its own time.


	30. Now Where Did That Come From?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wound reveal with a touch of ignoring an injury, but, like, for half an hour or whatever.

“--tman. Batman!” What. “Okay. Okay. Um.” What’s going on. “A-Agent A, Batman’s. Batman’s down, he’s--”

Jason. That’s Jason’s voice. Something must be wrong, for him to be panicking like that. What’s happened?

“--explosion, I don’t know where--okay. Okay. One minute. Give me a minute.”

White-hot pain explodes across his chest and he’s up, he’s up, oh good God he is  **up** .

Jason’s crouched beside him, eyes wide behind his mask. He looks decidedly singed, but-and admittedly, Bruce’s vision is blurry and unreliable-unharmed. Probably.

There’s two Jasons, he can’t be positive, but he thinks they’re both fine.

“Batman!” He must look terrible. “Don’t. Don’t move, okay? You’re kind of. You’re gonna be fine! But you’re...sort of...broken. Right now. So just don’t move, okay?”

Well, that won’t be a problem.

Unconsciousness would like to encroach, but it’s just not allowed.

“Robin. Report.”

Jason stiffens up and his hands stop fluttering in favor of settling in his lap.

“There a-appeared to be, um, explosives at the docks. Two-Face’s men made a break for it and set them off on the way out, and you got sort of...buried. But, like, between things, so it could’ve been worse, I guess, and I think you hit your head and you  _ definitely  _ got kind of...torn. I put an emergency wrap on it, but it needs stitches. A lot of stitches.” Investigation turns up a jagged piece of metal that does look very red. Well. That’s not good. “Agent A’s sending the car.”

Bruce is not looking forward to getting to the car. But on the bright side, Jason will  **not** be driving. It took one time of Dick’s emergency driving for him to install the autopilot.  **He learns from past errors.**

“Hn.”

“Just, um. Don’t move, okay?”

“You’re.” Speaking is painful. “Not hurt.”

“I’m fine. You were closer than me.”

**VROOM!**

On one hand, oh good. The car. On the other hand, oh God. The car.

Jason waits until said car is up close before shuffling a little closer and saying, voice soft and hesitant, “I can try. To help you. If that’d be easier.”

Bruce has made it home alone with a broken leg. He. Will. Manage.

“I’m fine,” he grunts, wishing that were true. That said, the wrapping is solid and nothing else feels horribly mangled. “Give me a minute.”

Now that his vision’s easing up-the two Jasons have become conjoined twins, now-he can see that the boy’s rattled; Jay’s pale and trembling a little, and he’s reopened a cut on his lip with that nervous chewing habit he always has.

_ I’m sorry. _

He forces himself off the ground, quietly grateful for Jason’s hovering, and makes his slow, painful trek to the car. Jason waits until he’s inside before crawling in himself.

“I get to drive, right?” he says, the shaky smile a clear falsity. Bruce sighs, reclines the seat back as far as it will go.

“Absolutely not.”

* * *

Bruce dozes on the ride back, coming to at Alfred’s quietly dangerous,  _ “Master Jason.” _

“I’m fine! He’s the one who bled everywhere--”

“And what is this.”

Jay’s hurt? He said…

_ That little liar. _

Dick was a master liar, capable of convincing multiple eyewitnesses that he absolutely had not done cartwheels on that banquet table. Jason doesn’t lie often...which is probably why he can usually get away with it.

He cracks his eyes open. Jason is several feet away, hand pressed to his side. Alfred is holding his bloody cape and looking about to smite him where he stands.

...is it so wrong that he thinks,  _ better you than me _ ?

“How did this happen.”

“But Bruce-!”

There’s a soft exhale through the nose. Jason has about three seconds to answer or perish. Mercifully, he knows this.

“I wasn’t quick enough to dodge a piece of metal,” he grumbles. “I saw it coming, I just wasn’t quick enough, I know I gotta work on that, now--”

Well. That hurts.

“Jason,” he says, wishing speaking didn’t hurt so much, “accidents happen. Clearly. This wasn’t your fault.”

“But I was farther out, I saw it--”

“Jay, you can’t hide injuries because you think you made a mistake.” He raises the seat a little. “Or at all, for that matter.”

“It’s not that bad-!”

“Still.”

“But you were--”

_ “Jason.” _

Jason sighs and inches closer, worrying at his lip again.

“Okay,  _ okay _ . M’sorry.”

Bruce is not convinced. But they’ll work on that, like they do everything else. It’s all they can do.

THE END


	31. Today's Special: Torture

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, Jason certainly thinks he’s been Left For Dead, so.

“Who do you hate?”

Jason breathes, tasting blood. He knows the answer. Well. He knows what Joker wants to hear. But he doesn’t...he just…

He doesn’t hate Bruce. He should, he knows; Bruce replaced him, just like that, but...he misses him, like a dog that’s been tossed out of the car misses its piece of shit owner. He wants his dad to come and get him.

He lifts his head, knows he’ll pay for this, and snarls, “You.”

Joker just laughs and breaks two of his ribs.

* * *

“Who do you hate?”

Jason looks at the purple blur through swollen lids. He hasn’t slept-hasn’t been allowed to sleep-for...he’s not sure. Too long. Every time he nods off, somebody nails him with what he thinks is a cattle prod. But he doesn’t hate Bruce. He doesn’t hate Bruce. He can’t. Bruce used to take him to Batburger and read to him when he was sick and listen to all his reasons why  _ The Shining _ was a good movie but a bad adaptation and…

Bruce loved him, didn’t he? Didn’t he?

“You,” he breathes, closes his eyes so he doesn’t have to watch the hit coming.

* * *

“Who do you hate?”

Joker. He hates Joker. But the bag over his head is sopping and he cracked something struggling to get away and he knows, he knows if he doesn’t answer right, the water will start again and he’ll drown even without water in his lungs.

He doesn’t want to die.

He doesn’t hate Bruce.

But.

It’s been nearly a year. At least, that’s what they tell him. And. And Batman hasn’t come. He doesn’t understand. He tried to be a good Robin. And...and even though there’s a new one, probably a better one, wouldn’t...doesn’t he matter? Isn’t he important enough to save?

He coughs and it hurts it **hurts** **it hurts**. Water drips warningly onto his forehead and he can’t do this again. God help him, he can’t do this again.

“Batman,” he whispers, feels something in his chest break. Joker laughs.

“That’s my little Robin,” he coos. “That’s  _ just _ what I wanted to hear.”

THE END


End file.
